The Committee on Race and Ethnicity, or CORE, brought a resolution to the floor of the Illinois Student Senate’s Wednesday’s meeting that would change the general education policy by making a U.S. minority cultures course part of the general education requirement.

The proposal could potentially add three hours to the current required course load.

The proposal would not immediately pass a resolution to put the extra requirement into effect, but would voice student senate’s support of the notion and also recommend a feasibility study to address the logistics of adding the requirement.

Calvin Lear, graduate student and senator, expressed concern that the additional general education requirement would not be “broad or deep enough to affect the student” and would turn into another requirement students would have to make room for.

Ron Lewis, sophomore in Business, spoke in support of the resolution.

“I think you have to take into account the fact that all of us are really busy,” Lewis said. “We’re college students, but that’s not an excuse not to learn about diversity and the things that affect us all.”

Jamie Magleby Singson, director of Inclusion and Intercultural Relations at the Native American House on campus, worked on the proposal with CORE over the course of this academic year and was in attendance at Wednesday’s meeting. Logistics aside, he believes the requirement would “add to the value of (a student’s) degree.”

Some senators spoke against the resolution, stating students would likely be more affected if they were to learn about diversity in American culture of their own volition instead of having a course requirement for it, but Farah Chalisa, junior in LAS, said she believed otherwise.

“The people who need (the course) the most will not try to become culturally diverse on their own, the people who need diversity training the most really don’t,” Chalisa said.

The resolution was postponed until the Academic Senate’s committee on educational policy formally reviews it.

Additionally, the student senate also allocated $3,707.50 to an event in appreciation of first responders, such as firemen and police officers.

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