KSA Election 2018: Candidates for Constituency Representatives

Mature Students Representative

Murdoch de Mooy
Criminology Major

Why are you running for this position?
If I win, this will be my third year on Council. I’ve been around for a little while and I’ve done little bits for constituencies throughout my tenure, made it so people didn’t have to run by legal name, so anybody trans could run under a name that they go by. [I want to] see if I can get the mature rep collective up and running.

Why should students vote for you?
I’ve been doing a lot of good work in the past, and we’re gonna see bylaws coming out in the AGM that I have been working on for the last couple years now.

Which experiences would you bring to this position?
I have two previous years … of being on Council, so I know how it works by now. I’ve been rewriting the bylaws and regulations, so I know how the organization exists, and how it operates … and [I’m] a mature student myself.

What would you like to change about student politics if elected?
Get more training for people who are on Council. A lot of times we get people on Council and they don’t know what we’re doing …. Also changing things for disability, working on social justice things … I’d love to have a daycare or something like that, for people who love to go to school but can’t because sometimes it’s just unaffordable.

Jasika Rai
Business Major

Why are you running for this position?
I want to bring [the] concerns of mature people, to help them out and to see what they want with the university.

Why should students vote for you?
I know what our university is and I know more of the people here because I’ve been volunteering for many hours. People recognize me and know who I am. Most of the people at the university know me so I think I can do this better.

Which experiences would you bring to this position?
I’m going to gain experience.

What would you like to change about student politics if elected?
I don’t know what is going on in the politics. Being in this position, maybe I’ll know more. I don’t know right now, but I will know soon.

Women’s Representative

Caitlin McCutchen
Political Science Major

Why are you running for this position?
I currently hold the women’s representative position and I found it to be really rewarding. I would label myself as a feminist and I believe that we need that voice and that presence on KPU’s campuses.

Why should students vote for you?
Over the past year, I’ve tried really hard to get the women’s collective up and running. I reached out to a sociology professor and they have a program you have to do that’s 100 hours of volunteer work, so I coordinated with her to get girls in that program or anyone who identifies as a woman into the women’s centre.

Which experiences would you bring to this position?
Considering that I’ve just done it for the past year, I’m also VP in the KSA so I know the limitations and also what I can do for the role.

What would you like to change about student politics if elected?
I feel like engagement is really low, and I know that this is something that has been touched on for many years, but I really want to make people aware of what the KSA is. Voter turnout was really low last year. Even just getting students active on campus and with the collective, outreach is something I’d like to improve upon with the KSA.

International Students Representative

Sanju Monga
Accounting Major

Why are you running for this position?
I want to support international students by introducing opportunities promoting their understanding and help them by knowing difficulties faced by them and would bring those forward to KSA. I want to guide and support them for a better academic life.

Why should students vote for you?
I am an extrovert who is always happy to help everyone. I am easy going and try to understand everyone’s situations. I believe international students should vote for me if they are seeking an advisor for opportunities or help for solving their issues.

Which experiences would you bring to this position?
Being an international student, I know most of the difficulties that are faced by other international students … Moreover, I have been doing new student orientations to get along with the new students at KPU. Furthermore, being a supervisor at my work gives me an opportunity to talk with people and attend meetings, so, I know how to present my opinion in front of everyone.

What would you like to change about student politics if elected?
Many students are not aware of the opportunities that KPU provides. I will try to bring the required awareness. Moreover, students sometimes get into trouble [and then don’t] know how to get out of it. It is very important to provide proper guidance to the international students for them to enjoy all the favourable incentives.

Yuvraj Kahlon
General Studies

Why are you running for this position?
As an international student, I know …what they need. Because the majority of students are international here…because if the person is from their community, people will understand them better. The most we have in Punjab, or basically in India, so I know what they’re needing, what are their demands.

Why should students vote for you?
I am from the community, and so I think that they will understand me better than any other candidate because they will see … a candidate whom they can trust and who could tell [them] the issues.

Which experiences would you bring to this position?
If I got elected, I could make their lives better [by] bringing a demand to the higher authority … so I can tell the problems easily to the department. If they have problems regarding their assignments, I could talk to their teachers on their behalf, who’d give some extension to them.

What would you like to change about student politics if elected?
If I got elected I could promote the students to participate in the elections and discuss their problems by getting votes and by meeting with them … If we had a meeting regularly, we could understand each other better … [and] make a link with teachers and students more effectively so that we could work and perform better.

Nevneen Kaur Samra
Engineering Major

Why are you running for this position?
I’ve seen the rest of the students who ran for this position and they didn’t really involve themselves much in the international students community, so I really wanted to see a change and the only way to actively participate in that change is to run for the position.

Why should students vote for you?
I have very large exposure to international students because I myself do work in the international office and I meet many students on a daily basis. I feel like someone who runs for this position should be able to talk to many international students.

Which experiences will you be bringing to this position?
I help students with everything from applying for renewal of their study permits to every single thing that they have to do on their journey. I specifically work in student life, which means that I organize events for international students. I think that’s a really big part because when they come to our country they need a break from all the tensions and all of the adjustments that they have to make.

What would you like to change about student politics if elected?
The biggest problem that I see with international students is not being able to adjust, and they feel it’s hard to socialize and make friends. I was planning on maybe making a few changes there and then bringing the community together as a whole.

Shivam Kataria
Computer Information Systems Major

Why are you running for this position?
They are increasing the credit amount every semester, so I can say something on that so that can reduce the credit or they can make it constant.

Why should students vote for you?
Firstly, I’ll try to do my best. Secondly, to be frank, people know me and they will vote for me, I think.

Which experiences would you bring to this position?
I’ll try to bring some changes [to] the university, like for the international students, it’s very hard to live over here, so I’ll try to change it. I can’t say [how] but I’ll change it. I don’t have any plans yet, because it’s one year, I’ll think and make the plans over it.

What would you like to change about student politics if elected?
Firstly, last year and this year I’m standing and it’s over after one year. I’m for president, if elected then I’ll run. Basically, I’ll change it so like—don’t do it for your image, just do it for the students. For your image like ‘woo I’m a President,’ not for that, do it for students because it’s a great responsibility to you as an international student.

Students of Colour Representative

Munir-Khalid Dossa
Policy Studies Major, Political Science Minor

Why are you running for this position?
I held the position this term too and I’m re-running for it because it’s been an amazing experience, getting to have important conversations with important university stakeholders, with the KSA, about representing people of colour on campus. There’s a lot more work that I want to get done in this position and I see great potential for growth, especially with the [students of colour] collective. With how diverse our school is, I think there’s a great opportunity to emphasize that in a positive way and help our institutions grow.

Why should students vote for you?
I hope that people have been able to benefit from the things I’ve been doing in office right now, and I’d like to take that opportunity to keep doing what I’ve been doing and to do more, and reach higher heights now that I have a year under my belt. I’ve learned how the society functions and I’ve learned how university administration functions and I’m willing to take those higher-level issues on.

Which experiences would you bring to this position?
I’ve been trying to rebuild and rebrand the students of colour collective, so one thing we’ve been focusing on this year is a lot more social engagement and social events. Another thing is I wrote a proposal for the KSA to form a social justice and equity committee … [to] help the mandate of social justice and equity, and [to] have a body in the KSA that is responsible for that.

What would you like to change about student politics if elected?
More support and concrete funding for constituencies is a really big thing. I’d like to see us utilise our space on campus more. We have our social justice room that was just built, I’d like to see that space utilised more for events and having meetings and things like that. I’d also like to see emphasis put on our policies in the organisation. We have a lot of expiring policies, so I’d like to see a more robust review on those ones.

Queer Students Representative

Joseph Thorpe
Human Resources Management Student

Why are you running for this position?
Same reason as last time, I want to make sure that there’s representation for that position. A lot of the time it’s vacant or people leave it and I wanted to be on it for a while and have a continual legacy. I like being [in the social justice office] … just in case a student comes … I want to be a support factor for LGBTQ students who maybe don’t feel comfortable talking to teachers … and can talk to a student much easier.

Why should students vote for you?
If you saw the Pride Parade and stuff like that, I’ve shown initiative in trying to get people to see Pride on campus and I’m trying to continue to do that. As well, it’s good to have someone to represent the position. If we didn’t have anyone in the position there wouldn’t be anyone to advocate for this side of things, so I think I’ve done pretty well for the short term that I had, but I want to continue doing that.

Which experiences would you bring to this position?
I want to bring more awareness events on campus, not just working with LGBTQ itself but all of the collectives on campus. We need to do more of a joint effort because our collectives are small and it’s better if we work together to try to create initiatives instead of working separately on our own things … Again, Pride month stuff and [rights for trans folks] still needs to be discussed. And I want to bring more awareness to sexualities that aren’t really represented like asexuality and intersexuality.

What would you like to change about student politics if elected?
I feel like it’s always been an issue that higher-level people in universities don’t really go to the bottom to talk to students about it. A lot of the time, if you have an issue when it comes to social justice stuff and you go to a place, usually you go to the KSA … but the university should be asking your opinion and asking what it can do better. There’s kind of a disconnect there and I feel like we need to work on that.

Aboriginal Students Representative

Sarah Strachan
Anthropology Major

Why are you running for this position?
I want to see more of a community on campus and bring students together.

Why should students vote for you?
I’m very active in the Aboriginal community.

Which experiences would you bring to this position?
I work at the gathering place as a student assistant as well as at the future students office as the Aboriginal ambassador. I have helped set up the Facebook page for the gathering place. I’ve brought students together over the last few months and set up meetings.

What would you like to change about student politics if elected?
If you’re a representative for something you should actually be a representative and be present in what you’re doing.