After spending almost $10,000 last week, the Graduate Student Council decided last night to give their pocketbook a break.

Instead, they spent most of their time discussing the overall state of the graduate community — announcing the first graduate-student survey in five years, meeting with representatives from two University offices and ironing out details for the annual Thanksgiving Dinner for graduate students.

GSC Co-chair Jenny Allen announced that the GSC was putting together a new survey targeted to the entire graduate-student population. The last time such a broad survey was done was in 2001.

“We need to better understand the graduate community — their demographics, their finances, their advocacy needs and their programming needs — to serve them better,” said Rebecca Kaplan, a second-year business student in charge of organizing the survey who “used to do this for a living.”

Kaplan asked for 10 questions from each GSC advocacy committee that will then be compiled and edited for the final survey, which will be conducted online. She also suggested the GSC offer incentives to ensure people take the survey.

Chris Griffith, Ken Hsu and Andy Hernandez, all from the Graduate Life Office (GLO), introduced themselves to the GSC and discussed future collaboration with the GSC. GLO is an office within that of the Vice Provost for Student Affairs.

One area in need of work, GLO and GSC representatives agreed, are the concerns of off-campus graduate students.

“We want to incorporate off-campus students into the life on campus,” said Griffith, director of GLO.

Hernandez, assistant dean of students, pointed out that more information is needed about off-campus graduate students with children.

“The University has no idea who is out there with children,” he said.

Hsu, meanwhile, added that just bringing together the graduate community was difficult.

“With undergrads, people start together as freshmen and then go to separate departments,” he said. “With graduate students, it is the opposite. We have to figure out how to bring people in different departments together.”

The GSC also decided to collaborate with GLO on instituting a “cadre” of student conflict mediators and on developing more leadership programming.

When the newly created office of the Vice Provost of Graduate Education (VPGE) came up, however, there was no clear answer.

“We’re not sure yet,” Hernandez said, when asked how GLO plans to work with the VPGE. “It will be a transition over the next couple months.”

John Pearson, director of the Bechtel International Center, also made an appearance at last night’s meeting, discussing the role of the Center on campus and answering questions about federal regulation on international students.

He said that approximately 60 new federal regulations came into effect after Sept. 11, and was aware that these rules worried many international students.

“On one hand, we don’t want them to worry,” Pearson said. “But on the other, we do need to tell them there is this climate in the United States.” This “climate,” he added, has brought more attention on international students over the last five years.

While there was much talk last night, there was very little cash being thrown around.

As compared to last week’s spending spree, the GSC only handed out $500 last night, money that went to the Halloween party Elm Street Murders, hosted by Chi Theta Chi.

The GSC did, however, discuss the upcoming Thanksgiving dinner for graduate students, for which $45,000 has been allocated.

After receiving complaints from graduate families last year that the venue of Wilbur dining hall was not family-friendly, the GSC decided to make sure there was an area especially for families at this year’s dinner.

Three possible caterers were also discussed for the food. Stanford Dining, which provided the food at last year’s dinner, submitted the lowest bid this year.