At its Wednesday night meeting, members of Ohio University Student Senate will vote on two resolutions and two bills, one of which would ask OU to no longer require international students to purchase the university’s student health insurance policy.
Currently, international students are required to pay for the university supplied policy regardless of whether they have insurance that meets visa requirements or not. That also includes making students pay for spouses and children that accompany them to OU.
According to the new bill, the cost of student insurance for a family of four with one student, a spouse and two children costs $7,904 annually. The legislation states that the cost of the insurance plan is “more than the minimum OU graduate assistant stipend, creating an unfair financial burden on international students.”
The other bill being presented to the body is a bill showing opposition to the recent United States tax reform bill, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.
This effort has been brought forth by Graduate Student Senator Ellenore Holbrook who is the primary sponsor. The Congressional act would repeal sections of the Tax Reform Bill of 2014 and remove some of the tax breaks granted to graduate students under the 2014 legislation.
The two resolutions being voted on include a resolution to establish a Vice-Interim Commissioner appointment process and one to determine if Students Defending Students should purchase business cards.
During their last meeting, Senate voted to table getting business cards for Students Defending Students.
According to a previous Post report, one of the two main causes was that all university funding for printing must first go through the OU student printing services to at least get a price estimate. The second cause was the question of whether or not Student Senate could go through a local printing shop as opposed to one that does not support local businesses.
