Student Presidents’ Roundtable (SPR) is working to create new traditions on the Case Western Reserve University campus. CWRU already has a lot of traditions, both on a school level and within each department, but SPR wants to create a deeper sense of community within the university as a whole.

SPR is made up of the heads of the Undergraduate Student Government (USG), the Undergraduate Diversity Collaborative (UDC), the University Media Board (UMB), the University Program Board (UPB), the Interfraternity Congress (IFC), the Panhellenic Council (PHC), the Class Officer Collective (COC) and the Residence Hall Association (RHA). They meet regularly throughout the school year to discuss issues relating to the school and its organizations.

Caroline Gray, chair of SPR, hopes to add more to CWRU’s traditions by introducing Federation Week, which is set to happen in April of next year.

According to Gray, a lot of CWRU traditions originated before the combination of Case Institute of Technology and Western Reserve University in 1967. The goal behind Federation Week is to create new traditions for the university as a whole.

Gray hopes that Federation Week will be able to solve some of the problems with student participation and sense of community.

“I think that Federation Week is going to be really interesting,” said Gray, “and hopefully a tradition we can continue in

years to follow. I am hoping that sharing some of the history of CWRU will help Case feel like more of a community.”

The SPR also discussed existing traditions, including Springfest. A proposal to link Springfest funding with the University Program Board (UPB) is under debate. Currently, Springfest is funded by the Student Executive Council reserve funding, instead of as an off-the-top (OTT) event, but this has led to complications with the other OTTs.

The possible funding change for Springfest raised questions on the funding of Senior Week and Thwing Study Over (TSO) and whether they should be extended the same invitation. Gray said that this would just be remaking these groups into OTTs. According to Gray, the funding decision has not yet been made.

SPR is currently deciding if they will be involved in making the shared calendar for all university organizations and events that was proposed by the Provost’s Commision on the Undergraduate Experience (CUE) in their recently released CUE report. SPR is hoping that the new campus engagement network replacing OrgSync will help with the shared calendar.

The SPR has also been making progress in the cooperation of the member organizations, and Gray is delighted about the team building that they have been focused on.

Events such as the Senior Class Gift Committee, created by COC, IFC and PHC and ‘90s throwback dance created by USG, UPB and COC were able to happen because of the cooperation.

Gray said, “We really haven’t seen a lot of co-hosting of events between these big eight before, so I think these types of events are a clear step in the collaboration direction that is the foundation of the SPR.”