Senators erupted into debate Thursday evening on the topic of endorsing the College Transparency Act. A bill, intended to throw SGA’s official support behind the federal act, was introduced to the senate by Sen. Jazmin Mejia.
Former Executive Vice President Briana Stanley was present at Thursday’s meeting as an advocate for the bill, and many senators referred to her for questions. After almost 30 minutes of discussion on the act’s purpose and parameters, the senate voted 10 for, 7 against and 2 abstentions, marking one of SGA’s most divisive bills yet.
The act seeks to establish a database that would archive student information to allow prospective students to determine if a university is the right choice for them. Some of the data would include post-graduate income for students in various career fields.
Within the proposed federal database, Stanley said students’ identifying information, such as Social Security number, date of birth and more, would not be included.
“I know for sure sensitive information is not reported,” she said.
Georgia State already gathers this information, so jumping to the federal level is supposedly seamless and won’t negatively impact students. According to Stanley, students won’t have to do anything.
“The only reason they [collect the data] is to change their curriculum to make it better,” Stanley said.
With the passing of SGA’s bill, Georgia State will now publicly and officially endorse the bill when it’s brought before Congress.
“We are the largest institution in the Southeast,” Stanley said. “It will give [legislators] the push forward to actually vote on this bill.”
