My Platform

As a Senator, Co-Chair, and Speaker Pro Tempore in the Wake Forest Student Government for the last two years, I've been able to gain key leadership experience while learning how to effectively advocate for the student body on campus. But I also saw many things that need to change on campus, and listed below are some of the things I would begin working to change on day 1.

Emphasizing the “Student” in Student Government:

Connecting a Visible, Transparent SG with the rest of Campus

It’s no secret that SG suffers from a visibility problem: we’re not connected enough with student life. Student Government should work to be more visible on campus, and play a more active role in connecting students: SG can and should use its unique position on campus to connect disparate student groups with administration support. Student feedback has guided every decision I’ve made in my roles in SG: by commissioning a campus survey with more than 1,100 responses on a struggling dining location, I was successfully able to lobby administration to provide new food options. This year, I commissioned another campus survey on academic space access which I successfully used to lobby for a new space access pilot program. The opinion of the student body has always been at the heart of my work and SG will continue to prioritize it under my leadership.
As Speaker, my mission will be to connect SG to campus by instituting an organizational culture of collaboration as well as a series of sweeping reforms, including:

1.

Requiring senators to host regularly scheduled “office hours” in their residence halls with their constituents so as to best advocate on behalf of the student body.

2.

Mandating that SG committee members meet regularly with relevant student groups to collect campus feedback directly.

3.

Hosting open door events in the SG office so students can connect with their student representatives and offer their unique perspectives.

4.

Directing the PR committee to set up a progress tracker for projects and legislation on the SG website as well as social media that is continuously updated.

5.

Increasing collaborations with other student organizations, and using the social media to publicize these events as well as non-strictly SG-related events.

Creating a More Accessible, Safe and Sustainable Campus

In my role as Physical Planning Committee Co-Chair, I’ve seen firsthand some of our university’s most glaring issues with accessibility, and one of my primary goals as speaker will be to help draft and pass legislation that makes our campus more accessible for all members of the Wake Forest Community.
For too long, sustainability issues have remained on the back-burner of SG priorities. As Speaker, I plan to create a Sustainability Committee to focus exclusively on how Wake Forest can do its part to curb emissions and protect our environment by collaborating with the University Office of Sustainability and environmentally-focused student groups.
As Wake Forest continues to grow, safety issues on our campus have become more important than ever. With the connections I’ve made in administration, I will continue to leverage SG’s position on campus to guide university policy in a way that puts student safety first.

Maintaining and Improving the Student Experience

As a member and Co-Chair of the Physical Planning Committee in Student Government, I can confidently say I have some of the most experience of any student at Wake Forest in terms of managing campus services on the student end.
As speaker, I will expand upon my advocacy success in dining - such as creating an open dining feedback form, replacing a struggling dining option, and striving to make the stress less pantry more accessible - and continue to prioritize student preferences and needs.
Lack of academic space continues to pose problems for students (as demonstrated in the survey I commissioned as Co-Chair that found a nearly 90% dissatisfaction rate with space accessibility), particularly during high-demand times such as midterms and finals. As Speaker, I will pursue SG-led initiatives to increase space access with the goal of having academic building collaborative space open 24/7.