CCC
By: Tucker Gibbs, Lily Hagge, Atishay Jain, Anna Kim, Erin Sackey, and Valentina Zhang
Elections for the Community Conduct Committee (CCC) will take place remotely from Feb. 15 to 16. Student Council announced official candidates Gracie Keyt, Drew Smith, Andy Horrigan, Sachin Schetty, Sarah Stein, Jack O’Brien, Henry Liu, Lexi Pelzer, Jolie Ng, Asha Bryant and Yifei Zhao, who are current lowers, on Jan. 26. The campaigning process began upon the announcement, and will continue until the day of the election.
According to Elections Committee co-head Charlie Preston, candidates are discouraged from campaigning until Feb. 8. “We don't want an overly long campaigning season, which I believe would benefit neither the voters nor the candidates,” Preston said.
Pelzer noted the benefits of Student Council’s online voting system. “Candidates will likely find out soon after that electronic polling,” Pelzer said. “They [the votes] will be counted much more quickly.” The top eight students with the most votes will be interviewed by the current CCC committee, who will select as many students as they wish.
Applications for the CCC candidates were due at noon on Jan. 26, and official CCC candidates were announced in Student Council the same night.
Candidate and lower Yifei Zhao shared his motivation for running, “As a student member [of the CCC], I really want to help people improve themselves based on their past mistakes.”
Ng added, “ In the CCC, I believe that the student perspective in a conduct system is very important. In a conduct case, students are more likely to be able to put themselves into others' shoes and understand their motivations, since we are all students ourselves.”
Preston emphasized the importance of informed voting. “Voters will need to think about their preferences before they vote and think about how they want to rank their favored candidates,” he said. “Voters should rank as much as they care to - the more names they rank, the more voice they have in the candidates. Not ranking past a certain number acts like a "no" vote for the other candidates… I'd like to emphasize that numbering multiple candidates does not weaken your preference for your #1.”
The four elected committee members will join seniors Nahla Owens, Senai Robinson, Graham Guite, Seth Amofa and uppers Tasmiah Akter, Toby Chan, Zander Galli and Alexandria Westray.
(CCC) has adapted to remote school through the use of electronic tools and asynchronous participation.
According to the 2020-21 Student Guidebook, “The adaptations… will allow students who have business with the CCC to asynchronously share their perspectives in a fair and equitable fashion.”
In addition, Dean of Residential Life Carol Cahalane noted the number of new cases heard by the CCC has declined due to remote learning.
“Naturally, with everyone at home, we’re not really seeing cases of students leaving dorms after check-in or being caught with rule-violating substances,” CCC member and upper Tasmiah Akter said. “The most common cause for a meeting over the past few months was for a probation or [community restoration] review. These were based on past infractions, with the options for the student to pass or fail their review.”
For each case, CCC members typically receive a physical file containing a student's transcripts, teacher comments and miscellaneous statements. Resources are now shared via Dropbox.
“After reviewing these, committee members have the option to send any questions to the student, which can help us make a decision,” CCC member and senior Graham Guite said.
Some members remarked that covering cases can be more difficult online than in-person. “During our meetings, we discuss all that we've learned from the files, ask questions, [and] ponder,” Akter said.
CCC is currently working on initiatives to ensure consistency and impartiality. “All of this can take a really long time (I imagine it is the same in real life) but we're all happy to put the time and effort in instead of rushing through,” Akter said.