A new NIU Student Association policy is aimed at improving poor attendance records of student representatives on university committees.

SA President Paula Radtke said alternate representatives will be assigned to certain committees this year. She said the alternates will replace representatives who no longer wish to attend the committee meetings they have been assigned to.

Radtke said she will talk to the student representatives if there are complaints about poor attendance. She will ask them to resign if they refuse to cooperate, she said.

Judy Bischoff, NIU University Council executive secretary, said several student representatives from the 1987-88 academic year had “very poor” attendance. She said student representation probably would be more effective if students had better attendance.

Radtke puts some of the blame for poor attendance on the chairmen of some committees such as the Judicial Review Team and the Monitor Sub-committee on Discrimination. Radtke said the chairmen did not always inform students of meeting dates.

Good or poor representative attendance depends on which committee the student is serving on, Radtke said. “Where students are ignored or treated in condescending manners, there is a high burnout rate.”

Bischoff said students sometimes are not interested in the committee they are appointed to and that they believe they have better things to do.

Students might feel overwhelmed with paperwork or with the size of the committee, Radtke said. She said students also have been made to feel unwelcome on committees such as the NIU Parking Committee or the Undergraduate Coordination Council.

“It would help attendance if students were made to feel more welcome at the meetings, but the change of attitude has to start at the chair level of each committee,” Radtke said.

NIU parking committee Chairman Bob Bornhuetter said three of the four students assigned to his committee last year “weren’t religious” in their attendance. But, he said, “It is not a question of the students not being welcome.”

Bornhuetter said students often are appointed to the committee during the middle of the semester and come into the meetings with no background of what has already been discussed or approved. “Then they ask superficial questions and (request) parking lot changes for their particular dorm(s).”

However, Bornhuetter said the students are not at fault for their insufficient background knowledge. He said he understands their frustration because they only serve on the committee for about five months, are responsible for a lot of paperwork and must vote on important campus issues.

Radtke said she will give representatives special information pertaining to their committees and help them make voting decisions this year.

Lou Jean Moyer, chairman of the Undergraduate Coordination Council, said most of the students on her committee last year did not attend meetings regularly.

“I understand that (the students) had classes and studies, but I was delighted when they could participate,” Moyer said. She said the two students who attended most of the meetings were very helpful with their input to the committee.