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Tuesday, March 26, 2024

Executive Office hosts farewell ceremony

NICHOLAS CHAN / AGGIE

Outgoing leaders honored, new leaders sworn in

The ASUCD Executive Office hosted a ceremony on March 16 to honor outgoing President Alex Lee, Vice President Abhay Sandhu and controller Joe DeAngelo, as well as to swear in the new President and Vice President, Josh Dalavai and Adilla Jamaludin.

Lee, Sandhu and DeAngelo all gave speeches at the event, during which they discus

NICHOLAS CHAN / AGGIE

sed their experiences in ASUCD as well as the challenges ASUCD faces.

“The truth is, I always found ASUCD [to be] a very intimidating place, something that I think needs to be addressed by our future leaders in order to make it more accessible and welcome to people not getting involved,” Sandhu said.

The executive team’s decision to host the event in the Activities and Recreation Center (ARC) Ballroom faced criticism from some students who believed that too much money was spent on the event’s venue.

“It infuriates me that senate and other units are forced to scrounge for financial support from outside departments for projects related to mental health, food and housing insecurity, and cultural competency, when the Executive Office can spend over 300 dollars, without any oversight, on an event that does not benefit students, or even the association, as a whole,” said ASUCD Senator Sam Chiang via email.

In previous years, Executive Office farewell ceremonies were held at Gunrock Pub, the CoHo or the Mee Room.

NICHOLAS CHAN / AGGIE

“What is disturbing about reserving the ARC Ballroom is the large price tag that our association would be using student fee money to fund, for really no reason but self pride,” said ASUCD Senator Shaitaj Dhaliwal via email. “When executive farewells do happen outside the mee room, they typically are held at the Gunrock Pub which is about half the cost as the ARC Ballroom.”

The evening of the ceremony, Lee sent an email titled “My Farewell Address: The Challenges Ahead” to the undergraduate student body in which he urged students to be vocal in both local and student government.

“We are more intelligent, more diverse as a student body than ever before,” Lee wrote in the email. “We can think outside the box and find new solutions to problems administrators or faculty may be overlooking. Institutions and bureaucracies are slow to move, but it’s our youthful energy that pushes them along. This is why the student perspective is so important. We cannot be silenced, we cannot tolerate worsening conditions, and we should not underestimate our individual capacity for progress.”

Written by: Alyssa Vandenberg  — campus@theaggie.org. Lindsay Floyd contributed reporting.

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