Meet the BOD

After one of the highest voter turnouts for the Wilfrid Laurier University Students’ Union (WLUSU) elections in recent memory, 15 directors for the board have been chosen. Of those 15, six are returning directors.

Returning director Jenny Solda received the highest total votes. Her goals for her second term focus on WLUSU becoming more accessible. “I’m hoping for more student advocacy next year, more awareness of WLUSU and just making this year better than last year,” she said.

New director Andrew Chudnovsky concurred, “The first thing I value is to completely open up the student government just to make sure that the students know what’s going on.”

He hopes to hold weekly hours in the Concourse as a medium of communication with the board where students can voice their opinions and concerns.

First time director Luke Dotto acknowledged, “It’s going to be a tremendous learning curve [for] the new board candidates.”

Elected for the third time to the board, Chris Oberle has announced interest in running for the position of chair of the board. Experienced directors Sunny Chan and Chris Walker shared the same sentiment.

Oberle outlined aspirations for next year focusing on preparing those elected for their roles. “The better training the board has, the more successful they’ll be. If we have poor training, we won’t have a very productive board.”

He also stressed the importance of communication between board members as well as from the board to students, specifically Brantford students. “It’s very obvious that the distance between Brantford in Waterloo is growing. We had online elections, which were more accessible, but Brantford still had a very low turnout.”

Oberle hopes for more meetings in Brantford, as well as socials and opportunities for the Brantford student body to interact with WLUSU.

Returning director Jon Pryce hopes that the chair will guide new and returning directors to work together to reach their common goals. “This year, a lot of the directors had all these lavish goals, and they forgot about them – they were too busy learning how to do the position, myself included.”

Pryce suggested that previous chairs could come in and give accounts of their experiences. “We could see different varieties … kind of piece it apart and say, ‘this is our model for the new chair.’”

Pryce aspires to be a mentor for new directors. “I could be there to help fellow directors achieve what they want to do,” he said. “It’s all about working together.”

Results

Newly elected:

Sunny Chan,
Andrew Chudnovsky,
Zach Desson,
Luke Dotto,
Scott Fleming,
Noah Habtemichael,
Nick Nyhof,
Bill Papanastasiou,
Ryan Sher,

Returning:

Jonathan Collaton,
Chris Oberle,
Tom Papanastasiou,
Jon Pryce,
Jenny Solda,
Chris Walker,