Monica Sanchez was re-elected to her post last year as the Graduate Students Association vice president of external affairs.
A former president who enjoyed working with external organizations, she promised to bring student voices to the state legislature.
Assistant News Editor JJ Yang sat down with the education graduate student on what her position entails.
Daily Bruin: What motivated you to seek a second term?
Monica Sanchez: It’s such a short amount of time to learn your position ““ I didn’t want the momentum of what we’re doing last year to die down. You never who’s going to come in the next year.
The year before (being elected vice president in 2006), I had been president, and I noticed I liked working with the external entities. We got to work the alumni, the students and the VP of external affairs from the 10 (UC) campuses. We would step outside and see what they were doing, engage with them and ask questions. I really enjoyed going and working with different people.
DB: Are there any specific issues you are currently working on?
MS: The biggest campaign right now is the Students Vote! Coalition, doing it in collaboration with the undergraduate government to register 8,000 new students.
One of our main issues is discussing graduate student funding. The University of California Office of the President had budgeted $10 million to be divided by the 10 campuses based on full-time enrollment. UCLA got $2 million, but it was earmarked by the executive vice chancellor to go to international graduate support. One of our goals is to get more graduate support, to see and give our input on where the money is going.
DB: How do you balance all of your responsibilities?
MS: It’s tough. One advantage is I have completed all of my coursework. What I’m doing right now is just collecting data for my dissertation.
I also plan ahead ““ I basically know next month where I’ll be going: UCLA board meetings, UCSA board meetings, GSA board meetings.
DB: Why are you interested in student government?
MS: It’s nicely aligned with my academic work. I’m getting my PhD in education, and I’m really interested in education policy for students interested in getting a higher education.
When I started going to these meetings, it was really interesting to me on how decisions were made. … I felt like I got accustomed to wanting to be involved with the decision making. It’s not only for my research, but I’m personally interested as well.
DB: Based on your experiences, what career do you wish to pursues?
MS: When I first came in, I was interested in being a professor at a university in sociology or education. I would also be interested in student affairs and higher-education affairs based on what I learned and my experiences.