Student self-governance is a key element of undergraduate culture at Caltech, which goes hand in hand with the Honor Code, collaboration, the House System, and a commitment to data-driven inquiry; Caltech students commit to caring for each other and solving collective problems in a scientific way. Alongside the House System, the other main body of undergraduate student government is ASCIT (pronounced "ask-it"), the Associated Students of the California Institute of Technology. Since January 1935, ASCIT has had the advantage of incorporation; as an independent non-profit corporation it operates free of Caltech administrative control.
ASCIT is governed collectively by its members, the vast majority of undergraduate students of Caltech. ASCIT members elect the six members of the Board of Directors (BoD). The Directors set the budget, manage corporation property, discuss and act on student concerns and issues, and represent the undergraduates to the faculty and administration on certain issues. The ASCIT Academics and Research Committee (ARC) represents undergraduates to faculty and administration on academic issues and runs a variety of academic related programming. The Honor System is exclusively under student control; it is administered and enforced by the ASCIT Board of Control (BOC). The ASCIT Review Committee (RevComm) runs campus-wide elections, interprets and enforces the ASCIT Bylaws, and appoints acting officers to fill vacancies.
ASCIT publishes The California Tech (the student-run weekly newspaper), the Big T (yearbook), the little t (a valuable student handbook), the Totem (annual literary magazine). A large portion of the ASCIT budget is designated for social events and the funding of the various student clubs on campus. ASCIT operates the Screening Room, equipped with media equipment for watching movies. ASCIT also rents out a theater showing once a year for ASCIT members as a substitute for classic motion picture showings on-campus, which were held in the past. Many of ASCIT's new services are consolidated on its DONUT website, which allows users to make reservations for the Screening Room and other club rooms, vote online, and perform price-checks on textbooks and sell or buy used books from other students.
To a greater extent than at most other colleges, undergraduates have a say in the policies of the Institute. Undergraduates serve on Faculty Standing Committees and have informal access to Faculty and Administration.
In 2002, the ASCIT President completed a SURF entitled "A History of Undergraduate Self-Governance at Caltech". It is helpful if you are interested in a primer to the history of student life at Caltech.