During election week, which spans from April 1 to April 8, candidates for the nine College Government (CG) cabinet positions will present their proposals to Wellesley’s student body. These elections will be indicative of the changes to take place at Wellesley in the next academic year.
As members of the college community, students should pay attention to the campaign proposals presented by our peers. After reviewing last year’s campaigns from the current CG members, we hope this year’s candidates pitch campaign promises that they plan to follow through on and if elected, make the utmost effort to do so.
Some of the proposals suggested by the current cabinet members were accomplished but not to an extent that makes these improvements noticeable to the student body. Instigating deep change in one year is a formidable feat, and the improvement would be more visible if cabinet members were to able to continue the projects started by past years’ cabinets. Changes made to the College would be more effective if they were to build on the achievements of previous cabinet members.
The current cabinet members stated during campaign week last year that if elected, they would pursue campus discussion on mental health. During the academic year, the CG cabinet established a committee to address mental health issues. Throughout the semester, this committee has been researching Wellesley’s mental health resources in relation to peer institutions.
Despite the efforts of the cabinet members, there is still need for more discussion on mental health on our campus, as well as more and improved resources. Several ongoing campaigns include mental health as well. Our current CG cabinet identified an aspect of Wellesley that urgently needs improvements, but their efforts need to be continued and improved by the next cabinet.
Though the cabinet has made some accomplishments this year, we’re still waiting on increased support for athletics, changes to the multicultural requirement, senator bonding and leadership workshops, among other proposed initiatives.
Many of these changes might still be in progress and are difficult to implement. However, the cabinet should inform the student body of any steps they have made on their original campaign proposals. This is not to criticize specific individuals but to provide an insight into how easy it is to make a proposal during election week and let it go once elected.
The accomplishments of the current nine cabinet members are also difficult to assess because of the ambiguous nature of the statements they made during campaign week a year ago. The current candidates should specify how they will accomplish their goals, and the student body should hold them accountable to these statements.
Increasing clarity during election week will help lead to more changes by enabling students to understand and closely follow the progress of the cabinet. This places greater responsibility on the elected members to fulfill the specific promises they made to the Wellesley community during their campaigns.
In order to hold elected cabinet members more accountable and better the elections process, the student body needs to pay close attention to election week and candidates’ statements this year. The Multicultural Presidents’ Council, College Government and House Presidents’ Council debates will take place today, Saturday and next Monday, respectively.
In order to request our cabinet leaders to be more active, we as students should be equally active in our demonstration of concerns and vote based on well-informed opinions of the candidates and their goals.
