The executive candidates running in the Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA) elections debated a variety of questions to a packed crowd in the UC atrium during the evening of Jan. 25.
Candidates focused on mental health services on campus, rising tuition fees, and the treatment of clubs and societies.
All three candidates for vice-president (student services) stressed the importance of properly equipped service centres to the quality of student life on campus.
“Service centres are home for so many students,” said Frena Hailekiros, current vice-president (student services) and candidate for the same position on the Your Carleton slate. Hailekiros added she would work to implement a grocery delivery service for students and bring a kitchen to Carleton’s Food Centre if re-elected.
To better promote events being held by clubs and societies, Real Leadership candidate for vice-president (student services) Ryan Hussey said he wants to create a comprehensive events calendar to raise student awareness of activities occurring on campus.
“Why should we add [events] if people aren’t even showing up now?” Hussey asked. If elected, Hussey added his team would lower executive salaries and use that money to increase clubs and societies funding.
Change candidate for vice-president (student services) Ashley Courchene said he wants to see better training implemented for service centre coordinators and would “create a fair hiring process” by removing CUSA executives from hiring boards.
Candidates for vice-president (internal) expressed their ideas for making CUSA more transparent and accountable.
“Councillors aren’t just here to run in an election,” said Taryn Ashdown, Change’s candidate for vice-president (internal). “They’re here to do something after.”
Ashdown said she wants to better advertise CUSA meetings to ensure more students can attend, and would work to modernize CUSA governing documents if elected.
Your Carleton candidate for vice-president (internal) Lauren Konarowski also expressed a desire to review CUSA’s constitutional documents.
“Transparency is a visual,” Konarowski added, saying she would “get these CUSA councillors out on the floor” to make them more available and provide students with “an equal voice and outlets to have their voices heard.”
Ryan Ofei, Real Leadership’s candidate for vice-president (internal), said students “need to change the way things are done in order to see results.”
As he stressed the importance of “putting people first,” Ofei said he would work to implement club creation workshops and feature club programming more prominently if elected.
Mental health services took centre stage along with the candidates for vice-president (student issues).
“My team wants to bring you better mental health action,” said Real Leadership’s candidate for vice-president (student issues) Humna Shaikh, who promised more funding for mental health awareness and action initiatives on campus if elected.
Your Carleton’s candidate for vice-president (student issues) Alexandra Noguera mentioned mental health and safety as the two largest issues on campus, promising to make campus feel “more safe and inclusive” by re-inventing international student orientation and expanding exam and mental health support programs.
Rasha Choudhury, Change’s candidate for vice-president (student issues), said her slate would work towards implementing greater environmental sustainability initiatives on campus, wants to see a greater representation of intersectionality during awareness weeks, and would advocate for lower tuition fees.
“If your executive slate won’t stand up and fight for tuition, who will?” Choudhury asked.
This year there were four candidates running for vice-president (student life).
Change’s candidate, Faith Luckson, and Your Carleton’s candidate, Zameer Masjedee, both emphasized the need for more multicultural programming and events on campus. Luckson added that first years want to see groups they can identify with.
Luckson said, if elected, she’ll work with Carleton’s Disability Centre to implement more inclusive events.
Masjedee said his platform is “all about enhancing the Raven experience” and his proposed events, such as a Welcome Barbecue and Homecoming, will foster a sense of school pride.
Real Leadership’s Hailey Mahoney, also running for vice-president (student life), said she wants to see more students participating in events on campus and plans to create an event calendar and a portal where students can submit event ideas. She also promised to “take away from executives salaries and give that money back to students, clubs and societies.”
Ahmed Syed ran independently for vice-president (student life). He said he wants to bring change to CUSA elections and promised he will work to bring transparency to the association. He added he wants to create larger-scale events, including a winter formal for engineering students to allow for more networking opportunities.
Transparency of finances and tuition were of major importance to all three vice-president (finance) candidates this year.
Change’s Keith Burley said he was “committed to putting change back in your pockets” by cutting executive benefits and communications office funds. He also added he will ask the university why they are sitting on a 72 million dollar surplus while increasing tuition fees.
“We’ll make sure that finances are secure and transparent,” said Real Leadership candidate Graham Pedregosa. He promised effectivity as vice-president (finance) because of his business experience as president and chief financial officer of the Rideau River Residence Associaton (RRRA).
“CUSA needs to start serving clubs and societies more,” Pedregosa said. He added Real Leadership was the only slate that did not vote in favour of raising executive salaries for CUSA.
Your Carleton’s David Andrews promised his slate will ensure students funds are spent “transparently and responsibly,” and said he would work to create new student jobs.
Andrews also said, if elected, he will tap into $15 million in scholarships that currently go unclaimed.
Both Burley and Andrews stressed the importance of clubs and societies at Carleton. Andrews said they are “an integral part of this university,” and Burley said if he is elected he will “make sure that clubs and societies are aware of the who, what, when, where, and how.”
The crowd was buzzing with excitement when the presidential candidates took the stage next.
Real Leadership’s Arpita Dar engaged with Your Carleton’s Fahd Alhattab early on in the rebuttals when she accused him of “running on recycled platform ideas.”
Dar referred to her experience with RRRA when asked about relationships with the GSA and university administration, saying RRRA has worked well with both in the past, and she can bring that to the table as CUSA president.
She also reiterated her slate is advocating for freezing CUSA executive salaries.
Alhattab, who is running to be elected for his second term as CUSA president, said CUSA demonstrated their ability to collaborate with the GSA after settling a lawsuit between the associations.
Quoting Ernest Hemingway, Alhattab emphasized he will strive to improve on his performance last year. He acknowledged he had a both a number of failures and successes when an audience member asked a question regarding the CUSA “I’m Gunna Vote” video.
“The secret of change is not in fighting the old but in building the new,” said Abdullah Jaber, the presidential candidate for Change.
Jaber said Change was the only team to advocate the lowering of tuition fees for both domestic and international students at Carleton.
“My job is to make you happy,” he added, saying he plans on being there for the students and listening to them.
The evening concluded with questions from the audience, most revolving around tuition fees and clubs and societies funding. One student asked if the next CUSA president would resign if asked to do so by students, with all candidates responding that there are means to resign and would tke into account the opinions of students.
Voting for CUSA elections takes place Jan. 27 and 28 by email ballot with results released Thursday evening.
