[Gsc-hca-family] Updates, no meeting this month

[Kevin Krsulich]

All,

I wanted to send out an update on what's been going on since we last
met. I decided not to hold a meeting this month for a few reasons, chief
among which was the fact that it didn't look like we'd have a
substantial enough agenda to justify getting everyone together,
especially when I'm sure people are getting increasingly busy with term
work.

My hope is that we will be able to carry out light discussion over email
so that we can keep the committee in a more constant state of motion,
and then meet when we gather up an issue or two that requires more
in-depth discussion.

So here are the current states of our outstanding topics :
   - Z center family access policy - Jason Walther has been in touch
with the Z-center's director of customer service who, after discussing
the issue with other Z-center administrators, responded that they have
no interest in adjusting their family access policy or pricing for children.

   - GSC Survey - Within the past few days, I've received a copy of the
results of the GSC's most recent cost of living survey. It contains much
of the useful financial and statistical data you would expect
(income/expense info, dependents, childcare usage, housing stats) but
also as expected, does not include some of the items we discussed at our
first meeting (childbirth statistics, safety statistics, sources of
income, etc.).

   - Parking and Transportion - Randall Lewis, Randy Churchill and I are
scheduled to meet with the Transportation and Parking Committee on Oct.
28 to discuss the rate structure and lack of benefits for families
living on campus. We will likely be meeting within a week or so to begin
planning for this.

   - Extended families - Jason Walther and I met with Dennis Collins and
 other members of the administration to discuss policy for extended
families at MIT's family residences. A tentative solution was to
implement a guest accomodation policy similar to that of Warehouse
(where spousal visits are common) where extended families are welcomed
to stay, informed of necessary safety and contact information, and in
exchange are given card and/or key access to the residence during the
time for which they've stated. The hope is that such a policy will
accommodate families who travel great distances while insuring that they
are welcomed, comfortable, and safe within the residence's community.

So the outstanding questions are:
 - Do we want to pursue this Z center policy further?
 - Would a custom survey be useful to our work this year? What questions
would we include?
 - Is anyone else interested in helping with the meeting the the
transportation committee? The more people we have, the more convincing
an argument we can make.
 - Thoughts/opinions on a policy to accommodate extended guests at
family residences?

Please feel free to reply all to discuss.

I'll get out the minutes for the past meeting within a day or two. Sorry
for the wait. Feel free to email me or the list with updates, opinions
or items you'd like to discuss.


Best,

Kevin Krsulich
GSC HCA Family Subcommittee Chair