YCC's new leaders hope to turn around image

By Krishanti Vignarajah

LIZ OLINER/YH Recently elected President Zach Kaufman (top), SY '00, and Vice-President Fawzi Jumean (bottom), MC '00, hope to make the YCC a much more visible organization.

With Yale College Council (YCC) elections now complete, the YCC's new guard is working hard on plans to change its image and boost student involvement.

Zach Kaufman, SY '00, who took the presidential election by a wide margin on Fri., Apr. 10, will team up with new vice-president Fawzi Jumean, MC '00, secretary Hilary Marston, JE '00, treasurer Melissa Milazzo, PC '00, and UOFC chair Adiya Dixon, BR '00. With the end of the '97-'98 school year fast approaching, these officers are already looking forward to the upcoming '98-'99 school year.

Founded almost 27 years ago by Bill Fowler, PC '72, the YCC was created as a sounding board for student opinion and a channel of communication between students and the Adminstration. But in recent years, many have accused the council of failing to represent the student body.

The YCC's new leadership is well aware of this image problem. "The YCC is, to a large extent, out of touch with the student groups," Jumean said. "The YCC needs more legitimacy to act effectively, and this can only be done by getting student opinions and acting on them."

As a result, the new board has generated a host of ideas to increase YCC representation of student voice, and Kaufman said that boosting the council's presence on campus is a crucial first step. "I think that the YCC as a whole and the YCC president specifically should be more visible on campus. There are some important issues the YCC should be forcefully vocal on," Kaufman explained. "Before we can ask other student groups to come to us, we must go to them. With our increased presence on campus, students will know who their YCC representative and officers are. We will be more accessible to and representative of the student body."

To this end, over the next couple of weeks, YCC leadership will be meeting with the heads of campus groups and various administrators to discuss agenda ideas and goals. Using the input from these meetings, Jumean said that the YCC hopes to create "a student forum that could meet once a semester to discuss pressing issues" in the fall. YCC leadership also hopes to use monthly surveys, polls, and referendums in dining halls and online for various issues needing student input.

One such issue is the process of band selection for Spring Fling. With concerns regarding the lack of student voice in the choice of band for this year's Spring Fling still an issue, the board plans to take more active steps to create a forum in which students may express their opinions. Among the proposals for the upcoming school year, the new board plans to use surveys to attempt to determine students' band preferences for Spring Fling.

Kaufman also hopes to boost unificaton among campus groups, including expanding co-sponsorships with Dwight Hall and other organizations. Kaufman believes that "co-sponsorship of activities and policy pursuits will bring the campus closer together so that even more people are successfully combining efforts to bring about positive improvements to student life at Yale."

Another important issue on which several members have begun working is the debate over faculty tenure. Kaufman, Jumean, and Marston have already begun to research tenure with members of the Tenure Action Coalition,and they plan to send out a fact sheet to inform the general student body about the intricacies of the debate.

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