This is the second iteration of The Gazelle’s Student Government review. This year we compared the platforms of various members of the Student Government Executive Board with what was achieved over the past academic year. This does not encompass the entirety of initiatives undertaken by the Student Government, both elected and unelected members, but with this comparison we hope to hold the present Executive Board to account and guide future administrations.

####Rend Beiruti - President

Rend Beiruti did not make any specific promises in her platform. In fact, she stated specifically that “I have decided not to pepper this platform with promises of this, that or the other.” However, she did mention that some of her motivations for running for president were to make make Student Government more transparent and less hierarchical and bringing Student Government and the administration into a conversation. She changed the format of General Assembly meetings to make them more inviting by bringing in bean bags and couches and having them organized in a circular format. Beiruti also ensured that Executive Board minutes in addition to the GA minutes, were published on Orgsync. However, the minutes from committee meetings are not published online.

She also worked on the ambiguity regarding the university’s leave of absence policy. She reached out to people on leaves of absence, carried out a survey regarding their experiences, and organized a GA meeting focused on leaves of absence. The GA was attended by members from the administration who answered question from students present and from students that submitted questions anonymously. As a result of the concerns raised by students at the GA meeting, the administration appointed Jess Castelyn as the point of contact for all leave of absence students. Beiruti has also been collaborating with Campus Life, Health and Wellness and the Office of Global Education to help in revising the policy, which is currently published on the Student Portal, as there are some conflicting deadlines.

####Maitha AlMemari - Vice President

In her student platform, Maitha AlMemari made three promises to the student body. The first was to have biweekly meetings with committee chairs, open to the student body. These meetings were not reflected in the minutes of either the General Assembly or the Executive Board meetings. However, in the fall semester AlMemari took the initiative to dissolve Committees that were no longer active. She also promised to match committees with SIGs but this is also not reflected in the minutes of either the GA or the Executive Board meetings. Finally AlMemari promised to make NYU Abu Dhabi a part of the city of Abu Dhabi. She achieved this through the Sufraa initiative, which held its first event on Oct. 12. Sufraa describes itself as a program “designed to equip, develop and prepare a selected group of NYUAD students to become effective ambassadors within the NYUAD and UAE communities.” The event was co-sponsored by the UAE Club. During her time as Vice President, AlMemari established a system in the fall semester by which members of the Executive Board were assigned members of the administration to liaison with.

####Patrick Wee - Global Vice President

Patrick Wee made three core promises in his platform. First, that he would fight for important global issues that matter to NYUAD students, second, to build a global community that we are all proud of and finally to connect the three portal campuses while championing NYUAD students across the world. Wee’s most significant work as Global Vice President was the Global Student Council Constitution. To draft this constitution Wee was flown by the university to New York, along with two other members of the Executive Board, to meet with their counterparts from New York and Shanghai at the Global Governance Conference. The conference was first proposed to be discussed in the GA of Nov. 20, but Wee was not present at the GA. What was developed out of the conference was the Global Student Council Constitution. Despite updating the GA on Jan. 29 and March 5, the GA did not vote on the constitution, and the project itself was ended on May 3 when Student Government announced on their Facebook page that NYU Shanghai had voted against the constitution.

In the fall semester, Wee was also the subject of a petition decided upon by the Board of Appeals. The Board ruled that he had improperly stood for the position of Senator at Large on the Student Senators Council in New York while also standing for the position of Global Vice President. The Board enjoined him from being a Senator at Large.

####Cyril Cuda - Treasurer

Cyril Cuda made four primary promises in his platform: to fairly distribute the budget between Student Interest Groups and other funding recipients, to remove bureaucratic obstacles that students and SIGs face, to listen to individual financial needs of SIGs and projects and to serve as an advocate on financial issues that fall outside of Student Government. Cuda allocated 40 percent of the Student Government budget to SIGs, 10 percent to class representatives, 12.4 percent to the Executive Board programming and 24 percent to the End of the Year event. He allocated the remaining 13.6 percent to the yearbook, committees, Student Government planning and Student Government systems. He also upgraded the budget allocation system using Orgsync, and brought forward SIG budget appeals to the Executive Board from the Equestrian SIG and DAO to put them up for a vote.

Cuda also worked on other financial issues outside of Student Government. He extensively recorded budget throughout the year and organized budgets from previous years with the aim that the documentation of financial history would inform the Funding Board in future years about trends and distributions of funds. Along with fellow Executive Board member Andrés López Schrader, he also worked on the delay and issues students have had in setting up their accounts with the National Bank of Abu Dhabi. Cuda worked with the Office of Student Finance to ensure that stipends are given before both spring and fall breaks. He has been looking into reopening the issue of getting more water dispensers on campus, as this project had been abandoned by the administration due to financial reasons. He is also assisting students in their financial disputes with certain departments within the university.

####Hafsa Ahmed - Officer of Communications

Hafsa Ahmed did not make any direct promises in her campaign platform. But throughout the academic year she wrote three Student Government newsletters. She has also worked to boost Student Government’s social media presence, reviving its Snapchat account and actively updating its Instagram account as well. She was also responsible for forwarding Ideascale submissions to their corresponding university department or office.

####Christine Dah-In Chung - Officer of Student Activities

Christine Dah-In Chung made a number of promises in her platform when she ran for this position in the spring of 2016 against Nina Bambysheva. Chung offered to guide and support SIGs during the planning and budgeting process as well as make students more familiar with the process of SIG registration. In addition, Chung proposed to regularly check-in with SIGs and encourage more joint SIG events. Chung also suggested that she would lead a more structured SIG fair, promote the OrgSync website, update the NYUAD Student Handbook when needed and open up new official positions within SIGs.

To make good on these promises Chung oversaw the SIG Fair in the fall and ran a SIG training session at the beginning of the fall and spring semesters. Chung also spearheaded the development of a SIG calendar with all major events held by SIGs. This was first brought up at the Sept. 26 Executive Board meeting and then proposed on Oct. 31 by Yi Yi Yeap. By Nov. 7 Chung began to follow up with SIG leaders about their upcoming events. This calendar was distributed at the beginning of the Spring semester.

Another initiative that Chung led was Spirit Week. This was first proposed at the Feb. 22 Executive Board meeting and the week was held from April 23 to April 30. Events included the annual Interclassico, brunch at Campus West Restaurant, coffee with the Coffee Collective, a campus marathon and beach day.

####Joseph Chu - Officer for External Affairs

In his platform, Joseph Chu said that he would make it his mission to bring together students across universities in the UAE. To this end, Chu organized one event at NYUAD where students could meet students from the Sheikh Mohammed Scholars Program on Oct. 9. Chu also promoted two other events held by Zayed University, a tolerance day on Nov. 15 and the Zayed University Spring Carnival held during spring break. Chu also very rarely participated in GAs, being absent four times and with no comments recorded in eight GAs out of a total of 13 GAs across the past academic year.

####Yi Yi Yeap - Class of 2017 Representative

Yi Yi Yeap did not make any explicit campaign promises; however, she did make many references to food and uniting her class. Throughout the academic year she organized seven class activities that involved food. Apart from her class responsibilities, Yeap also led several Student Government initiatives such as organizing the printing of business cards for students. She was also the one who originally proposed hosting a GA meeting with Residential Education. Yeap also proposed that each member of the Executive Board create transition folders with information for their successors.

####Kelly Murphy - Class of 2018 Representative

In her platform, Kelly Murphy mentioned two things that she wanted to improve in her role as class of 2018 Student Government representative: she wanted to make Student Government more interesting and appealing to draw a larger proportion of the student body to the GAs and she wanted to expand committee visibility and representation. The first was to be done through changing timing, location, voting methods and ways of hearing students’ concerns. Though Murphy did bring it up at an Executive Board meeting, nothing in this regard changed. More visibility and representation in committees was also not reflected in GA or Executive Board meeting minutes. Murphy arranged an almost weekly section at the GAs called “Keeping up with Kelly”, in which she proposed amendments to the Student Government constitution in order to smoothen the constitution. Murphy was flown to New York in fall semester with Patrick Wee and Christine Dah-In Chung to work on the Global Student Council Constitution.

####Tamara Gjorgjieva - Class of 2019 Representative (Spring 2017)

Tamara Gjorgjieva promised in her platform to create non traditional office hours, class outings and weekend activities, improving the connection between study-away students and the NYUAD campus. She also advocated for better coordination with the administration specifically with the Career Development Centre in assisting study-away students with summer internships. Gjorgjieva also mentioned she would aim to increase transparency and student involvement in policy changes and suggested knowledge transfer sessions in which students could meet alumni and upperclassmen and network. These initiatives are not reflected in the GA or Executive Board meeting minutes. However, she did take part in arranging a series of Skype calls with study-away sites like Buenos Aires and Washington D.C.. Gjorgjieva also played an active role in arranging Spirit Week along with two other members of the Executive Board.

####Jacob Chagnon - Class of 2019 Representative (Fall 2016)

Jacob Chagnon did not make any concrete promises in his platform. He expressed that he wanted to integrate in his class community for his work to reflect his class’ sentiments. Many of Chagnon’s comments at meetings reflected the idea that Student Government should engage more with the student body, fitting well with his platform. As per the GA and Executive Board meeting minutes, Chagnon also brought up the issue of SIG funding — specifically the problem of an increasing number of national SIGs being founded while SIG funding remained unchanged.

####Andrés López Schrader - Class of 2020 Representative

Andrés López Schrader promised in his platform to make events and excursions specifically for the class of 2020 to foster a strong sense of community. In line with this aim, Schrader arranged two events that had never happened before and were exclusive to first-year students. One was an interactive concert with Dubai Drums, and the other involved bringing a tailor to campus, measuring abayas and kandooras for first-year students so they could dress well for the UAE National Day. Schrader also pushed for the College Parents Picnic event, in which upperclassmen as part of the College Parent program could sign up to receive a picnic basket to share with their first-year ‘children’. Furthermore, Schrader, along with two other members of the Executive Board, arranged this year’s Spirit Week.