WSA Fills Vacant Seats

An unprecedented number of seats became vacant on the Wesleyan Student Assembly (WSA) this year as representatives left due to issues such as scheduling and lack of faith in what the body is accomplishing. The WSA Appointments Committee filled all seats last week after receiving a high number of submissions.

“Last year we had five seats up for election but this year we have eight,” said WSA Coordinator Nandita Vijayaraghavan ’13. “The reason for this is that last year, a large number of sophomores and juniors were chosen for full-year terms. They had terms that carried on until the end of this fall. A lot of the juniors had to go abroad and according to the [WSA] constitution their seats go back into election, so from five seats it went up to eight seats.”

According to Vijayaraghavan, some representatives chose not to return to the WSA because of the time commitment. Two students informed Vijayaraghavan of their resignation after the beginning of the Drop/Add period, noting course load and time-consuming Sunday WSA meetings as the motivating reasons. One member of the class of 2011 who stepped down wanted to do other things during his last year at Wesleyan. Yet another student had to resign because he was not returning to campus.

At least one representative, however, expressed disenfranchisement with the WSA.

“I feel like the WSA has lost track of helping students and a lot of what the WSA does is really about the WSA,” said Bradley Spahn ’11, whose seat on the Student Budget Committee (SBC) is now vacant. “Every year you see dozens of freshmen super excited to get on the WSA and then they spend a year at Wesleyan and they don’t want to be on the WSA anymore. Students aren’t that excited about what the WSA does. If the WSA can’t fill its seats…maybe they should be doing something different.”

Spahn was one of three candidates in last year’s controversial election for WSA president. He announced his resignation from the WSA early this semester.

Others maintain that the WSA still serves its purpose well but criticized the politicization of WSA proceedings.

“They do indeed get carried away with the politics of it all,” wrote Sylvie Stein ’12, a former WSA representative who is abroad this semester, in an e-mail to the Argus. “And then sometimes—entirely inadvertently—they can allow these politics to interfere with their duties as representatives.”

On Friday, Sept. 24, 2010, Vijayaraghavan sent an e-mail to students notifying them that four additional seats on the assembly had been vacated and would be filled by appointment.

Three of the seats were for the newly formed Community Outreach and External Affairs Committee (COEAC). A seven-member committee, it deals with student group recognition, Middletown-Wesleyan relations, and community issues arising within the campus or area community.

All of the available seats were filled last week. Interested students were asked to submit a statement of interest, along with a peer reference, and were later interviewed by the Appointments Committee. The Appointments Committee should, according to the WSA Constitution, consist ofVijayaraghavan, the chair of the respective committee for which there is a vacancy, and another member of that committee. Due to the relative inexperience of most members of the COEAC,however, Vijayaraghavan requested that WSA Vice President Ben Firke ’12 sit as the third member of the committee, which she has the authority to do with the permission of the WSA President.

The WSA chooses to have appointments rather than elections for these seats to ensure fairness and to preserve the class year balance.

“Having another election so quick after the first election, we won’t have the same participation,” said Vijayaraghavan. “Also, a lot of students’ classes have started so they won’t be able to campaign. It wouldn’t be a completely democratic election because not everyone would take part. We’ll be able to give the classes of 2011, 2012, and 2013 a voice.”

After informing the student body of the openings, the WSA received more responses than originally expected, with upwards of five to six applicants for each committee.

“We’ve gotten such a huge response,” said Vijayaraghavan.  “And very luckily for us it’s coming from the upperclassmen. We do not want there to be a huge number of freshmen on the WSA because then the opinions of the upperclassmen that have been here for a while won’t be heard.”