Archivist Note: Originally published on the Elections wordpress site, Sep 18, 2015 @ 01:12, “CANDIDATES STATEMENT September Elections: 2017 Class President”
Emma Porter:
Hello! My name is Emma Porter, and I am running for 2017 junior class president. I am really excited about the opportunity to work together and continue to build on the sense of community that welcomed us into Bryn Mawr back when we were first-year students.
In my time at Bryn Mawr so far, I have enjoyed collaborating with fellow classmates and other members of the community, which encouraged me to consider running as your class president. Last year, I served as a Customs Person in Rhoads North, where I learned the value of communication between the student body and administrative offices. I have also founded two student groups on campus, one of which being “First Go-ers” for first-generation college students. In my involvement in “First-Goers”, I found the importance in providing a sounding board for students, which would be the role I would adopt as the junior class president.
As your class president, I will actively listen to my classmates to continue to make Bryn Mawr our own. I value SGA as a platform for the student voice, and I will represent our class and vocalize the desires and concerns of our community at weekly SGA meetings.
In addition to acting on student input, I will foster a stronger community within our class. First, I am excited to welcome in our new sister class of 2019 by working closely with their president(s) to host combined 2019/2017 teas. I also look forward to reaching out to the many members of our class who are abroad this year, and send them post-cards from their friends at home!
I am excited to launch my campaign to become your next class president, and I hope to connect with many more of my classmates. Please fee l free to contact me at elporter@brynmawr.edu.
More information about elections and the other candidates running can be found at http://elections.blogs.brynmawr.edu/; or you can contact the elections heads, Joy and Delaney, at jschan@brynmawr.edu and dcwilliams@brynmawr.edu.
Thank you for reading, and I encourage you all to vote. Voting will take place starting September 21 at 9 am through September 22 at 7 pm.
Best wishes,
Emma Porter
Jess Shill & Katherine Nickols:
We are running for 2017 Class Presidents because we want to help make our classmate’s penultimate year at Bryn Mawr as memorable as possible. Junior year is a key year—we’re finally over the sophomore slump and many of us are studying abroad—but it is also a very stressful year. With many of us studying abroad this year, it is easy to lose touch with our classmates, hindering the tight knit community fostered at Bryn Mawr. We will do everything in our power to prevent that from happening and make sure that our class will stay as connected as possible this year, no matter how busy we all are.
We plan on doing this by planning even more class teas, along with reaching out to those abroad by sending postcards and care packages to remind them of home. We also want to make the class teas more inclusive and accessible for every member of our class by hosting them at hours for people with extracurricular activities, or for those who live off campus, could attend based on their schedules. That way, we can have the maximum amount of members of our class there, allowing us to build relationships with members which we may not have been able to foster otherwise.
Through these teas, we as class presidents will also seek to hear the voices of our class so we can better represent their ideas and voices in SGA. We want to be accessible and transparent to our fellow reds, so we will try to be as visible on campus as possible and keep you up to date on current SGA matters via social media, email, and our teas. This will all help strengthen the unity of our class, while also helping us represent our class as accurately as possible.
We also want to stay connected to the rest of the community, and continue to maintain our already strong relationships with the evens (2016 and 2018), and help guide our sister class through their first year here. We will do this again through the class teas, but instead of having them be exclusively to our class, we will have teas with the other classes as well.
Although we have not previously held positions in SGA before, we have always wanted to get to; we just were not sure what position would be best suited for us. We believe that junior year class co-presidents is the position for us, and we believe that we have the experience to do this because we both have extensive backgrounds in leadership. Both of us are members of the Varsity Soccer Team, where we have gained invaluable leadership experience and time management skills. Furthermore, we both have very different academic backgrounds, and the combination of these will help us plan and manage the best class events. Jess is an Economics major, so she has the knowledge to make sure we’re maximizing the budget we’re given. Meanwhile, Katherine is a history major with a focus on Gender, Sexuality, and Race, so she will ensure that all events are inclusive and enjoyable for everyone. Together, we believe that we have the necessary experience and desire to make junior year at Bryn Mawr the best year yet for each and every one of our fellow Reds.
Sedi Agawu & Alexis Wiltshire:
Hello! We are Sedinam Agawu and Alexis Wiltshire and we are running for 2017 class presidents. We can be contacted at sdagawu@bmc and amcdonald@bmc. Sedi is a junior anthropology major on the pre-med track. Alexis is a junior history major. We are interested in the position of Class Presidents because we want to foster a better sense of community within our class, as well as create a more inclusive environment. Bryn Mawr is an institution that really values connections and community, and we want to further that ideal. Our ideas include hosting teas for transfers and McBrides in the class of 2017. We also want to continue the tradition of holding sibling class teas and postcard making teas for our classmates who are studying abroad as a way of including them in our community, even though they aren’t physically here. Another idea we had is to make our events more accessible to those with disabilities. We want to do more to bring attention to the struggles of students with disabilities, and make sure that we’re doing our best to keep students with disabilities feeling safe and included on Bryn Mawr’s campus.
Concerning our involvement with SGA prior to this semester, Alexis was the 2014-2015 Perry House Dorm Co-President and therefore served on the representative council. She is currently one of the junior history major representatives and has experience working with others, collaborating on projects, and organizing events. Sedi has held several leadership positions, including Customsperson and Dorm Traditions Representative, as well as Dorm Representative. Since we both have experience in communication and event organization, we plan to draw on this to help us more efficiently plan events for the Class of 2017. We also want to draw on our class community, because ultimately, we are here to represent their ideas. We plan to stay in contact with our class in order to make them really feel like we are doing our best to be there for them.
We are both very excited for this opportunity to become Co-Class Presidents, and are looking forward to being able to represent such an amazing class!