Student Council Committee Heads Turn Over

Student Council (StuCo) has undergone an overhaul in recent weeks, as newly elected representatives and committee heads officially assume their positions. Student Council President and upper Ayush Noori, who led his first Council meeting this week, announced the new committee heads in an email last Wednesday, April 3.

Twenty-four uppers and lowers will be leading StuCo’s ten committees: Budget, Dining Hall, Elections, Public Relations, Policy, Student Life, Recreation, Technology, Committee on Community, Equity and Diversity (CCED) and Mental Health.

Noori eliminated the Constitution and Assembly Committees this year. “We felt that the work that they were doing was not appropriate for the committee structure and did not require them to meet every week, so we are pursuing other avenues … to continue student involvement with assemblies,” Noori said.

While class, dorm and day student representatives are elected every spring, committee heads undergo a separate application process that consists of a written application and recommendations from previous the committee heads. Typically, the appointments are jointly decided by the outgoing committee heads and executive board members.

However, StuCo faculty adviser Laura Marshall articulated that “it is ultimately up to the President to appoint all committee heads.” The 2018–19 StuCo Constitution confirms this, as it states that it is within the power of the President to “appoint any student he/she wishes, at any time, to serve as a Committee Head.”

Noori appointed several candidates to committee head positions they did not apply for—a decision also made by the previous two years’ Student Council presidents. “Just because someone applied for a committee head … doesn’t mean that they have the requisite skills for that position,” Noori said. “It is the responsibility of the executive board to select the most competent pool of committee heads who can make a tangible impact on student life. The Constitution gives us the right to make those judgement calls.”

Upper Smaiyl Makyshov, who has worked for Elections Committee since the fall but was selected as Policy Committee head, expressed his initial surprise. “I worked at Elections Committee in the past, but the Executive Board made it clear that I was a better fit for Policy Committee given the policies that I proposed when running for StuCo Exec president,” Makyshov said. “After having a thorough conversation with Ayush, I was convinced that the Policy Committee would be the best fit for me among all positions available.”

Makyshov was not required to re-submit another application with a new statement detailing his goals specific to the Policy Committee.

Lower Haruka Masamura was similarly puzzled when asked to lead the Dining Hall Committee, considering her year-long work with the CCED. Masamura voiced uncertainty about how Noori had made a connection between the two seemingly disparate committees. “Since I applied for CCED, I do not have clear plans for Dining Hall Committee as of now,” Masamura said. “Ayush did mention that Dining Hall Committee used to be one of the most popular committees and he wants it to go back to the way it was.”

According to StuCo President Ayush Noori, “creativity and ingenuity,” “skills and experience,” as well as the “potential to do impactful things” were important qualities he sought in prospective committee heads. “It was a multi-faceted decision but we strive for it to be equitable and to create a committee head pool which will work really well together,” Noori said.

In spite of alleged abnormalities in committee head choices, Noori looks forward to working with the new heads, who he believes are well-equipped to serve the community. “I think the final decisions are phenomenal committee heads who are wonderful people and leaders who have great potential to do impactful things.”

Apart from committee head appointments, the efficacy and accountability of dorm representatives have come into question amidst elections taking place this week. Dorm representatives serve as a link for communication between StuCo and dormitories; their responsibilities include dorm budget planning, attending weekly StuCo meetings and updating dorm mates about StuCo initiatives.

Upper representative-elect, lower and Abbot Hall resident Josh Lum raised concerns that the dorm representative election process reflects a lack of serious regard for the position, recounting the latest election when Abbot residents discredited the voting system by casting ballots for someone who was not a candidate. “The people who were running gave semi-serious speeches with some humor, but when the voting came everyone was saying to vote for one guy who wasn’t even running as a joke,” Lum said. “Someone added at least four fake ballots for that candidate and he ended up winning, but still didn’t want the position.”

For Bancroft dorm representative and upper Ramyanee Mukherjee, the problem lies in the student body’s vague understanding of what responsibilities the position entails. “I think people take the election seriously, but people don’t take the position itself as seriously, which is why not that many people run each year,” she said. In Bancroft, there were only four candidates for three positions.

Since taking on the position, Bancroft dorm representatives admitted that they do not always fulfill all their responsibilities, such as sending out email updates on the Council’s progress. “It is hard to be sending out emails every single week when there isn’t really a lot of significant stuff covered in Student Council,” Mukherjee said.

Whatever the problem may be, Noori said that StuCo is working to address these issues in various ways. “We are already reforming the ways we send the agendas and minutes in the coming year and we are trying to make it more accessible so that dorm reps can give that commentary,” he said. “It is a problem the council faces and over the next year we want to very strictly codify the responsibilities of dorm reps.”