For the first time in five years, there will be more than one
candidate running for the Graduate Student Association president.
This year’s election brings two new candidates to the
platform.
Vice president of internal affairs, vice president of external
affairs and vice president of academic affairs are other positions
for which candidates will be competing during the week.
Amanda Moussa, the uncontested candidate for vice president of
external affairs, could not be reached for comment on her candidacy
after placing numerous phone calls and sending several e-mails.
All enrolled UCLA graduate and professional students can vote in
this year’s GSA elections from Thursday at noon to April 28
at noon by logging on to MyUCLA.
In exchange for voting, students will receive a coupon for a
free medium coffee at any UCLA coffee shop.
Both presidential candidates, Jared Fox and Kristina
Shagramanova, emphasize the lack of graduate student involvement in
GSA, and both candidates have different approaches toward enforcing
a change.
The president, who oversees all aspects of the association, is
responsible for conducting GSA cabinet meetings and coordinates the
work of the cabinet members.
“I think dedication is needed more than anything else.
Ideally, you want to have a lot of involvement in GSA already, and
it is very important that the president is willing to put in the
time and energy that is required to make things happen,” said
Hanish Rathod, current president of GSA.
This year, Rathod and his office have accomplished numerous
goals such as sending letters to regents and the state Legislature
regarding the graduate student fee increases, passing a legislative
arm for GSA and increasing the presence of the UCLA Alumni
Association in graduate students’ daily lives.
Rathod said he hopes next year’s president will carry on
the initiatives created by this year’s officers and would
also like to see the legislative arm fully developed and given the
resources it needs to be effective.
Fox, a first-year doctoral student in computer science, focuses
on the fact that before any sort of change can be made, graduate
students need not only to show interest in the issues facing them,
but also to become actively involved within GSA.
“Most students at UCLA are really not that interested in
GSA,” Fox said, referring to the generally low voter turnout
in past elections.
“We could present a huge message and tell them it is very
important that we continue to fund graduate education in the state.
Great graduate schools bring great amounts of money to the areas
surrounding them.”
Fox, a graduate from Arizona State University, plans on pursuing
his goals for his office by increasing GSA’s communication
efforts within the graduate student body.
Though unable to articulate specific plans of publicity at
first, Fox said to update graduate students he plans on posting
flyers and sending e-mails.
“Communication is the biggest effort that has to be
made,” Fox said.
With the possibility of graduate student fees increasing by 40
percent, Fox says GSA needs to strengthen its voice in a
coordinated fashion.
Fox, who has gone to Washington D.C. and lobbied for this issue,
feels that this should be GSA’s number one priority.
At ASU, Fox was president of the Association of Computing
Machinery, and recently has been involved in researching the energy
policy in the United States.
Like Fox, Shagramanova sees a lack of involvement between
graduate students and GSA mostly because students do not realize
that such an entity exists within the graduate community.
Graduate student tuition increase, lack of post-doctoral funding
and creation a more unified graduate community are issues among
Shagramanova’s top priorities.
Shagramanova, a third year dental student, would love to see
graduate students from different graduate schools come together and
socialize.
“It will be cool just to party together, we never have
UCLA graduate schools come together to enjoy programs and
goals,” Shagramanova said.
Because GSA is structured as a forum, Shagramanova said, it is
essential to make sure that the representatives do their job in
communicating issues to the greater graduate student body.
To fight the drastic budget cuts that will heavily effect
graduate students, Shagramanova said she will continue to encourage
students to write letters to the regents and the state
legislature.
“The more people that are involved, the more problems we
can solve. … I’m not going to think about things alone,
together we can come up with the logical solutions to some of the
problems,” Shagramanova said.
With reports from Menaka Fernando, Bruin senior
staff.