USB devices to replace handbooks

In light of the decision earlier this year to discontinue providing yearly student handbooks, the SFSS board decided to order 10,000 USB flash drives to hand out to students at the beginning of the fall semester.

“Essentially, it would serve the same purpose as the old SFSS handbook. Not only would it be a gift for students to use during their year at SFU, but it could provide information about our services,” said External Relations Officer Meaghan Wilson.

Although no prices were given, the estimate was around three dollars per device. The handbooks had cost the society approximately four dollars per book.

Some of the possible content that could be loaded onto the drives is a link to the SFSS website, which is currently being revamped, and a Clan schedule. These would be permanently embedded into the drive.

Arts and Social Sciences faculty representative Alia Ali voiced concerns that adding content to the drives would take up too much space, which wouldn’t allow students to effectively use it for storage. Wilson responded that the drives she was currently looking at were one gigabyte, which would be ample space for word documents and smaller files.

Wilson was tasked to follow up with a quote at a future meeting.

Atrium food vendor talks continue

The Greek Opa! restaurant was approved to occupy the northeast portion of the Atrium in MBC. The Atrium is currently undergoing renovations to accommodate more food vendors.

Treasurer Kevin Zhang is meeting with Chartwells this week to discuss that option as well. “The food court will be delayed. It’s unlikely it will open in September,” said Zhang, though he added that it would be clearer after this week.

URO Jeff McCann voiced his support for the Chartwells option. “The university really hammered it to them from my perspective in terms of what they were able to do,” said McCann, referring to the recent contract renewal.

– David Dyck