The election of junior Jonathan Reyes to the Student Association’s general assembly caused a lot of deliberation at Monday night’s meeting.

Reyes ran for the assembly saying Latino students need better representation in SA and said he could provide a voice for the community. Reyes said at the meeting, which was held at 7:30 p.m. in Maxwell Auditorium, that he was inspired to run for SA because he said he believes Latinos are not reaching high enough levels of involvement in the Syracuse University community.

Reyes said segregation is a large issue on campus and ethnic groups tend to stick together. He said he plans on starting initiatives to help the multicultural community integrate.

‘Segregation is a testy, touchy subject. SA isn’t being bold enough,’ he said.

The assembly deliberated the election of Reyes with conflicting views on the topic of multicultural integration. Several members said SA was already an ethnically diverse group. Assemblymember Gregory Harts expressed concern that Reyes only spoke about multicultural issues and not about the College of Arts and Sciences, which he would be representing.

SA President Neal Casey said multicultural initiatives are sensitive and charged issues, but he is happy to see someone come in to the assembly passionate about making changes.

‘That is what we support in Student Association, students bringing an initiative in and then going passionately to make something happen,’ Casey said.

Although there was opposition, Reyes was elected to represent Arts and Sciences along with freshman Ivan Rosales and senior Kemi Akindude. Freshman Elizabeth Kahn was elected to represent the Martin J. Whitman School of Management and sophomore Michael Downes was elected to represent the School of Information Studies.

The elections of Reyes and Akindude were significant because of their upperclassmen standing. Casey has previously said SA is underclassmen-heavy and members have been working to recruit upperclassmen.

Kahn’s election required minor deliberation because she is also a member of University Union, which was viewed by some assembly members as a conflict of interest. She was elected, however, on the grounds that as an assembly member, she would have an indirect role of money allocation to UU.

The final seat for the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications was filled by sophomore Ben Jones. The position was contested by junior transfer David Fisch. Both candidates said they would work to reach out to Newhouse students with the use of social media. Jones argued he was the better candidate because he was more familiar with the university community. Fisch said even though Jones has been on campus longer, he was part of the student government at Brandeis University and had more experience.

Several members argued Jones was not a valid candidate to represent Newhouse because he will transfer to Arts and Sciences for the spring semester. Others expressed concern about Fisch and said he presented himself unprofessionally.

After the elections, Casey noted that SA has now passed the 75 percent capacity mark, but recruitment still needs to be done in the School of Architecture and the School of Visual and Performing Arts. The School of Architecture currently has no student representatives while VPA has three seats filled out of 10.

Bonnie Kong, Academic Affairs Committee chair, said in her report that Don Saleh, vice president for enrollment management, is planning to speak to the assembly Nov. 14 about the transparency in the SU ranking and admission process. She updated the assembly on the progress of the SA’s Academic Integrity Resolution to create a student board. Kong said the structure of the student council is in the works.

Other business discussed:

Three bills were passed at Monday’s meeting after the recommendations were made by the Finance Board. The Obscure Cinema Society was granted $491 for a Halloween Double Feature, UNICEF was denied $537 to fund their Halloween Dance Party and Alpha Tau Omega was denied $1,016 for a hot dog eating contest.

In his report, Casey was enthusiastic about the climbing number of assembly members and expressed optimism about filling the rest of the seats. He also spoke about members being interviewed on Citrus TV about their initiatives.

rebarill@syr.edu

Published on October 3, 2011 at 12:00 pm