On Thursday, for the first time, the Oakland University Board of Trustees held their second meeting of the academic school year at OU’s Anton/Frankel Center in downtown Mount Clemens.

The BOT indicated they would like to hold annual meetings at the center.

“We hope this gets bigger and better as time goes on,” said Gabe Anton, who, along with Stewart Frankel, donated the center to OU in 2010.

The BOT formally introduced two new board members, Dennis Pawley and Scott Kunselman during the meeting. This was also the first meeting with board member Michael Kramer serving as BOT Chairperson.

During the two-hour meeting, which was dominated by talks of student housing, a multitude of topics were up for consideration.

Below is a list of what was discussed at the Oct. 3 BOT meeting.

Student housing

The BOT heard housing proposals from Public Financial Management, Inc. — a company run out of Chicago — which partnered with OU to come up with various proposals to the housing problem.

The university’s key housing objectives included increasing the number of undergraduates in the housing system and completing renovations to existing residence halls — all while minimizing the cost to students and the impact on the university’s credit.

The BOT is considering privatizing and building the new housing structure at an off-campus site, or building the new housing structure on campus with university financing.

Both the Student Congress President, Samantha Wolf, and Vice President, Robbie Williford, spoke out against an off-campus student housing building.

“I firmly believe that if I hadn’t lived on campus, I wouldn’t be where I am today,” Williford said. “In order to put students first, you need to fully fund and operate student housing.”

While the BOT did not reach a decision on what to do with housing, there was a consensus something had to be done as the lack of housing might be affecting how many students choose to attend OU.

“How many students do not come to Oakland University because they can’t find housing?” said OU President Garry Russi. “I suspect, as demand increases, that number will as well.”

Oakland currently has 2,068 beds on campus for the 19,740 students enrolled for the fall 2012 semester.

“We’ve drawn mainly from Oakland and Macomb counties,” said Mary Beth Snyder, vice president for student affairs and enrollment management. “With limited housing, that’s almost as far as we can improve.”

Oakland used 16 other universities to judge whether they were doing a good job compared with their peers on the issue of housing. OU found they have significantly fewer beds on campus per student than their peers. They also found the university’s retention and graduation rates were lower than their peers.

“We do not require our freshmen to live on campus and a number of our peers do,” Synder said. “We would love to have more freshmen here because we think it is directly correlated with how they do in school.”

The BOT agreed the issue of housing should be addressed. They reached a unanimous agreement to move to the next step of the process, which includes getting more information on how much the project could cost.

In-state tuition rates for student veterans

Interim Senior Vice President and Provost Susan Awbrey presented a proposal to the BOT which would allow all veterans, regardless of their place of residence, to be granted in-state tuition rates while attending OU. The amendment was unamiously passed.

AAUP contracts

More than a month after the university and the American Associate of University Professors reach a tentative agreement, the BOT voted ratified the OU and AAUP contract.

“Both sides did a fabulous job,” Kramer said. “I think it is a very fair agreement for both sides.”

Russi recognized and thanked both the OU chapter AAUP Chief Negotiator Micheal Latcha and the President of the OU AAUP chapter, Karen Miller, for their hard work during the negotiations.

Proposed media arts and social sciences center

The BOT heard from the Tamara Jhashi, acting dean of the college of arts and sciences, on what will be the next building proposal for the university.

“The proposed media arts and social sciences center is the university’s highest priority capital out-reach request,” Jhashi said.

The OU media arts and social sciences center would house classrooms for a variety of liberal arts departments, as well as a renovated theatre.

The center would be created from a combination of new construction and renovations to Varner Hall.

The proposed center would provide 20,000 sq. feet of general-purpose classrooms and would accommodate 1,000 students.

The center would be 229,000 sq. feet in total.

The university is still in the early stages of the project. Costs and layouts are still in the early process.

The next BOT meeting will take place Dec. 3 in the Elliot Hall Auditorium at 2 p.m.