Small crowd attends first State of the Undergraduate Association address
Small crowd attends first State of the Undergraduate Association address
Monday night marked the first State of the UA address, headed by UA President Jonte D. Craighead ’13.
“I am confident in saying that [the UA] is in a much better position than we were two years ago,” Craighead said at the opening of the forum.
About 20 students attended the forum portion of the event, with more students around at the end just to eat the food. Craighead mentioned that the address was meant to be an experimental addition to the periodic UA study breaks that occur throughout the term — he attributed low attendance to the timing of the event, both to being earlier in the evening and falling on a Monday after a long weekend, when students are likely to be inside doing work.
In relation to how the UA’s performance now compared to before the reconstruction, Craighead that it would be “much more difficult in the old structure” to get the things done that the UA has in the past year. Craighead said that it is much easier to make validate a statement about student opinion when you have the student leaders of the living groups — each of the dorm presidents and representatives from the IFC, Panhel, and the ILGs — all in the same place at the UA Council meetings.
The speech was given in parts by Craighead, Vice President Michael P. Walsh ’13, Chair of the UA committee on education Naren P. Tallapragada ’13, Secretary General Christine M. Sowa ’14, and Finboard Chair Johnathan Kongoletos ’14. The presentation outlined what the UA has been doing in the past semester and some of the initiatives that they have put forth, such as the Costco-Target shuttle. The main motivation behind giving these presentations, according to Craighead, was to reach out to the students more and let them know that the UA is actively working to improve life for students on campus.
—Stan Gill