Election results for the Scarborough Campus Students’ Union (SCSU) executive were announced last week, ending a month-long campaign. All of the victorious candidates belonged to the unopposed UniTSC slate.
Jessica Kirk, who currently serves as vice president, equity for the SCSU, was elected president for the upcoming year.
Kirk told The Varsity that she is excited to continue contributing to a long history of student activism, citing the new Ontario budget, which largely eliminates tuition fees for students from low-income families, as an example.
“I am excited to work with our members at UTSC and students across the province to continue to make university increasingly accessible,” she said. “[We] are all excited to work together with students on bringing new campaigns, services, and events they would like to see from their student union.”
Kirk also explained that she wants to find new ways to engage members. “One of our goals is to build capacity at UTSC,” said Kirk. “The Scarborough Campus is a commuter school, which makes it difficult for students to get involved on campus or feel like they are a part of a campus community.”
Sitharsana Srithas was elected vice president, external. Srithas served as the Tamil Students’ Association president for the past two years.
“I am truly excited to work with students on making UTSC a better campus for all,” said Srithas. Srithas said that she wants to see a shuttle bus connecting the UTSC and UTSG to increase accessibility. She also intends to have more options in terms of mental health resources, for those at the Health & Wellness Centre.
Thomas Wood is the incoming vice president, academics & university affairs after having served as an associate to his predecessor.
“I am most excited to start working towards a more accessible academic environment at UTSC by opening up spaces where students can come together and constructively talk about our academic experiences, and ways that these experiences can be improved on,” said Wood.
Wood explained that he hopes to see more spaces where students can come together and discuss academic experiences, as well as work to produce more frequent academic fora and exit surveys after dropping courses.
Nafisa Mohamed, who formerly served as a co-president of the African Students’ Association, will be taking over as vice-president equity. Mohamed spent this year as the associate to the current vice president equity.
Mohamed told The Varsity, “The current and previous vp equities have worked on some amazing campaigns that I hope to continue to work on. I’m very excited to work with the various student groups on social justice issues as well as work toward advocating that the university make more socially responsible investments.”
Correction (February 29, 2016, 8:03 pm): A previous version of this article reported that Nafisa Mohamed is currently the co-president of the African Student Association. In fact, she is the former co-president and served in 2014–2015. The Varsity regrets the error.
