All the general representatives of Undergraduate Students
Association Council sat in their office, talking about patching up
the holes that previous USAC officials had left behind. The ones in
the walls, of course.
As the new officials prepare for their third USAC meeting
tonight, many are slowly moving into their offices in Kerckhoff
Hall, ringing in the new council with a style all their own.
USAC officials are currently in the process of transition, as
former officials leave their Kerckhoff offices to make way for new
councilmembers.
Looking around the barren office, General Representative Brian
Neesby pointed out the various holes in the wall, which his two
colleagues said he could fix.
“Are we allowed to paint?” asks P.C. Zai, another
general representative, adding she would like to paint the room
blue.
“Bruins United blue,” said Jonathan Cohen, a
third-year business economics student and Neesby’s roommate,
who was on hand to see what the general representatives were doing
in their office. All three officers ran under the Bruins United
slate in this year’s USAC election.
The white walls of the office, illuminated with sunlight, showed
the various strips of double-sided tape left behind from the
move-out of last year’s general representatives. The new ones
alluded to ideas for new items on the wall, such as posters and a
bulletin board for newspaper clippings.
Outside the office, in the fourth-floor hallway, the general
representatives’ corkboard was empty and staple-riddled.
Throughout the move-in process, the general representatives, as
well as the rest of the officials, have begun their staff
recruitment. All of the general representatives have chosen chiefs
of staffs, and have been conducting interviews to fill other
positions within their respective staffs.
Marwa Kaisey, the third general representative, said she will
look to hire students from the general UCLA student body, as well
as certain others she had in mind.
Neesby said they expect to have 30 staff members between the
three general representatives.
For the summer, Zai said she would bring an espresso machine,
but will have to take it back to her room in Rieber Hall when the
regular school year starts again. “We should get a disco
ball,” Kaisey said.
Downstairs in Cultural Affairs Commissioner Todd Hawkins’
office, the transition is a bit smoother than in other offices.
This is because the office will look exactly the same as it did
last year. Former Cultural Affairs Commissioner Shantanu Bhuiyan
sat near the door of the office, sealing manila envelopes for the
JazzReggae Festival, saying the room is an accumulation of
memorabilia from many past events.
Bhuiyan said Hawkins has been training all year to fill the
position, and the transition of the office will be smooth.
The room does not look like a traditional office at all. Walls
strewn with banners, photos of students at events and T-shirts make
for a seemingly random yet welcoming amalgam.
A mountain of boxes, filled with shirts and other goods, sits in
the far-left corner of the room.
Saira Gandhi, a second-year international development studies
student and a volunteer for the JazzReggae Festival, said the room
had been “tagged” ““ decorated with graffiti art
““ years ago, but then it was used to film a scene in the 2004
movie “First Daughter,” and the art was painted
over.
Now, the walls of the office have taken on a whole new life.
“The things on the walls define what cultural affairs
is,” Hawkins said.
Down the hall, Internal Vice President Kristina Doan adorned her
office with something a bit more youthful ““ an Easy-Bake
Oven.
Sitting atop plastic filing shelves against the wall, the oven
lay dormant, never used since its purchase.
Doan said the oven was actually already in the office, from when
Darren Chan was internal vice president, but she plans on replacing
the bulb to make it work again.
She said she already has a reputation for baking, as she brought
homemade cookies to the USAC meeting on May 24.
The oven is just one of the things left behind by Chan and
former staff members. Doan said she has progressively moved old
belongings out of the room, or has just thrown them away.
“It’s hard asking your friend to move out of the
office,” Doan said.
She said the move into the office was somewhat easy because she
had been a staff member for Chan and was familiar with the
office.
Even so, Doan said the transition to this year’s USAC was
“a lot quicker than all of us expected.”
Doan said she hopes moving a lot of the old property ““
much of it in disrepair ““ will allow the office to feel
larger and more “welcoming.”
Neesby’s chief of staff Jesse Melgares said students
should realize they do have a voice through the officials at
Kerckhoff, and councilmembers will always be in their offices for
students to contact them directly.
“Although elections are over and we aren’t putting
fliers in your face, we’re still here,” Melgares
said.