#amselections

[ubcunderground]

one. hour. left

like, oh my god becky, look at those panicked people. There’s only one more hour until all the madness is beginning...

[iamablogubc]

AMS Exec candidates' vision for the future

We used our exclusive telekinetic abilities to find out exactly where each AMS Executive candidate sees the organization moving forward:

President

Cheneil Antony-Hale: The AMS has divested itself of any holdings in corporations that have engaged in business transactions over the past four years that involve the exchange of money for products or services. The AMS has been the subject of 3 segments on the O'Reilly Factor discussing the takeover of college campuses by liberal interests.

Aaron Bailey: The AMS has decided to engage in a student "strike" in protest of the absence of a campus brewery further increases to international tuition. Students have been urged to attend daily Block Party events to rally around something that nobody's quite certain of.

Viet Vu: The AMS bylaws have been amended to require all constituencies to complete an annual re-registration process that involves holding multiple referenda and proceeding through countless bureaucratic hurdles to receive recognition. Vu is quoted by the Ubyssey as having muttered "an eye for an eye" under his breadth at the most recent AMS Council meeting.

Vice-President, Academic and University Affairs

Jenna Omassi: LPC will be moved under the Academic portfolio under the auspices of everything the AMS does being academic-related. When Bailey's plan to reinstate ACF with the name of AMS County Fair goes through and the AUS sues its own parent (resulting in the landmark Supreme Court case AMS vs. AMS) Omassi will experience a conflict of interest and resign the post. "No" will have its victory; one way or another.

Vice-President, Administration

Ava Nasiri: "This'll be the year, I'm telling you" as the AMS announces construction for the new SUB will finally come to a close in 2019.

James Jing: "Oh, AMS stands for Alma Mater Society? There go my plans to sell the acronym naming rights to raise money for transit."

Alexander Remtulla: In addition to existing initiatives to require students to complete at least one first nations or social justice course during their time at UBC, students will also be required to successfully storm the wall at least once per year and earn a minor in kinesiology over the course of their degree.

Vice-President, External Affairs

Jude Crasta: UBC as we know it will have been dismantled. Crasta will have successfully lobbied the University to end the construction that has plagued the student experience. Instead of traditional infrastructure, all funds will be dedicated to expanding transit capacity. Skytrain cars and buses will be a new "informal learning space" under the flexible learning initiative.

Janzen Lee: The AMS will adopt a new policy of zero-based spending. Fees are meant to be seen, felt, and heard—but not used. Lee will ensure the AMS has banked reserves for a massive political campaign that may never come.

Vice-President, Finance

Mateusz Miadlikowski: "The AMS is proud to announce that, following much consultation with constituencies, Councillors, and the community at large, the AMS Student Nest will be renamed. Today, the AMS unveils The Gallery—no, not the restaurant. The building. The whole damn thing. The Gallery will be a 19+ venue intended to be accessible to everyone, to provide them with the quintessential student experience and opportunity necessary to perhaps one day lead the organization."

William Pigott: The Alma Mater Society of UBC Vancouver is a part of the North American Division of the AMS Group of Companies. AMS Group is a privately held Swiss conglomerate with holdings in 187 subsidiaries across the globe. The organization has come under fire in recent months for receiving over $120M USD in government subsidies, in spite of paying an average tax rate of just 3.7% on $2.7B in profits over the past eight months. AMS Group is under investigation from the Securities and Exchange Commission and RCMP for engaging in corruption of foreign officials and University administrators. The AMS Group owns an 87% stake in the United States Democratic Party, holds 34% of the shares in Wells Fargo bank, and has formed several joint ventures with Koch Industries.

[iamablogubc]

Endorsements: SLFS

Student Legal Fund Society. Let's make this simple.

There are two slates:

Students for Accountability (Tanner Bokor, Jude Crasta, Carol Dou, Ron Gorodetsky, Bahareh Jokar, Kathleen Simpson)

Students For Responsible Leadership (Lama Al-Awawdeh, Julius Foo, Nathan Ho, Janzen Lee, Michael Northfield, Cameron Sharpe)

The latter, with Janzen Lee being the SLFS's incumbent President, is essentially business as usual. SLFS has been inactive and unaccountable to students for years. It's an embarrassment and the Society should be shut down if it can't do more than it has so far. We endorse Students for Accountability (Tanner Bokor, Jude Crasta, Carol Dou, Ron Gorodetsky, Bahareh Jokar, Kathleen Simpson).

[ubcunderground]

Dear Ubyssey: We love you, but come onnnn

When we say that we love the Ubyssey, it's not a feeling of obligation, it's a true bond that takes us down to their hellhole of an office in the hallway that smells like poop (thank you AMS In-Vessel Composter!!!) But we gotta talk about elections...

Last week, our fellow VFM compatriots at iamablogubc wrote a piece on how disappointed they were with the coverage that's coming out this year. We felt it was pretty misguided. There were some factual errors (the AMS doesn't collect their fees), as well as just some pretension that we were miffed by. 

Two weeks into the elections season and we still have yet to see any strong content from our beloved campus paper. Aside from debate recaps that are a week old and updates on candidates who dropped out, there's not a whole lot we've seen to inform voters. While we like to think VFM blogs are precious and valuable, the campus press informs more voters than anything else, and if there isn't any journalisms they can follow, then what's the point? Since their Monday issue wasn't the elections one, we're assuming they plan to publish their endorsements on Thursday...the second to last day of voting. 

The Ubyssey is arguably the most influential media outlet on campus. A well informed outlook of the AMS elections would be very beneficial for voter turnout this year. All we wanted to say was that we want more from you.  

This article has been updated to reflect a correction in this post's stating IAmABlog did not know the Ubyssey was autonomous. We'z regret ze error.

[iamablogubc]

Endorsements: Board of Governors

Let's start with the easiest of the three. We endorse Veronica Knott. She's been a vocal member of AMS Council this past year and she's been willing to take on added responsibilities. From her experience as EUS President, we think she's built up an ability to work with University administrators on key issues. Our biggest concern is that she might be somewhat abrasive to those who disagree with her, but at the same time, a tough skin isn't such a bad thing on the Board of Governors. We're confident she's the right choice.

Then we have two remaining choices: Tanner Bokor and Julie Van de Valk. Bokor is somewhat polarizing, and while we wouldn't say he's done a bad job as AMS President, we're not exactly sure he's earned the trust and respect of his fellow AMS Councillors or proven to the electorate that he isn't the politicizing candidate he often seems. That said, Van de Valk is essentially the "divest" candidate in this year's race (following up on the introduction of one last year), and we think she's riding that bandwagon a bit too much towards victory. We're unsure she knows enough about the University and its governance, given her lack of related experience. To that end, our second endorsement goes to Tanner Bokor.

[iamablogubc]

Endorsements: Senate

(Check marks ✓ indicate who our endorsements go to.)

Aaron Bailey: A President who's on Senate. That'll be interesting. To start, we dislike Bailey's expectation that he will be the default Student Senate Caucus Chair (per his platform). The time commitment of him serving on Senate—never-mind Chairing the Caucus—while also serving as President will be extremely challenging. Without regard for his specific platform points, we think this is an unnecessary position for him and feel he will have a say in key academic discussions as AMS President. While we would have endorsed him were he not the likely winner of the Presidential race, we think voters should give this opportunity to someone else who might make it a greater focus.

Margareta Dovgal: Dovgal is an interesting candidate for Senate. Much less known than many of her competitors, she is nonetheless experienced through her past role as AMS Equity Commissioner. Her platform (what we could find) revolves around a limited subset of issues, but we feel she's demonstrated a reasonable degree of insightfulness in her discussion of the issues. We think she'd add a diverse voice to the Student Caucus, and will perhaps serve as a bit of a wildcard—in a good way. We can't quite justify an endorsement for her, but we'd be strangely okay with the idea of her as a possible winner in this election.

✓ Marjan Hatai: Hatai's platform focuses on some relevant issues, like co-curricular transcripts, earlier exam schedule releases, and a first semester Reading Break. Yet, to pick as many large issues as this and provide very little detail on how to complete them is unideal, especially for someone with limited relevant experience. We are not sure she is ready to take on all that she has announced she intends to, or that her experience makes her as well catered to this role as others. That said, one might've said that about her being the Referendum Coordinator for the AMS's fee restructuring, and she played that role out quite well in the end. This endorsement's a tad bit tepid, but we offer it nonetheless.

✓ Jenna Omassi: There is a great deal of value in the VP Academic serving on Senate. Although Omassi's platform points are somewhat general, we believe she is a good choice for much the same reasons we endorsed her for Academic.

✓ Gurvir Sangha: Sangha is very likeable and has put a considerable amount of effort into his campaign. His platform is well-formed and well-informed, but—as is often the case—much of it may go out the window the moment he is elected. What concerns us, however, is that he has been a very quiet member on AMS Council this past year (in spite of being the AUS's "Chief AMS Representative"—whatever that may mean). Senate requires people to be outspoken. It requires them to be willing to raise controversial opinions and be comfortable doing so in front of committees full of, well, senior faculty who tear apart ideas for a living ("peer-reviewed academic literature"). If Sangha has been so passive on AMS Council, we're concerned about what he would get done on Senate. At the same time, we think he would be a good team player on the Student Caucus and would be committed to the role. We endorse him, but feel he owes it to students to prove that he deserved their vote over the course of the next year.

✓ Ian Sapollnik: While it is demoralizing to penalize ambition, it's difficult not to wonder whether Sapollnik will achieve his election goals—for instance, "increase the number of scholarships at UBC to match other Canadian universitiesı." At the same time, some of his points (e.g. "Create student representation in [faculty] curriculum committees") are admirable, important, and surprisingly, somewhat different from the norm in this race. We think he's unlikely to win this race, and that's okay—but he should further his involvement (prospective AMS Councillor or Education Committee member-at-large?) over the next year, and would be happy to see him in the race again next year. That said, we're impressed with his knowledge and interest for someone that doesn't make the cut as an AMS insider, and thought we should take a chance on something a bit different for a change. We endorse Sapollnik for Senate.

Hannah Xiao: We were unable to obtain sufficient information online or elsewhere on which to come to a conclusion on Xiao. To that end, we did not consider her for an endorsement.

✓ Eric Zhao: An over qualified and perhaps a bit-too-smart-for-most-of-us candidate, we have some faith Zhao might actual make some progress on his ambitions election platform. We're confident in his ability to gain the respect of the faculty and alumni that make up Senate and its committees. We endorse him wholeheartedly.

Viet Vu: Vu has served as the Vancouver School of Economics Undergraduate Society (VSEUS) President since its inception one year ago. The process for recognition for VSEUS has been botched left and right, leaving us unsure that  Vu demonstrated the strongest possible leadership over that process. In our eyes, he hasn't been the most effective advocate for his own students as President, and while we imagine he is equally intent on this role, we think he hasn't proven to voters that he's earned it as of yet. 

Note: Vu reached out to us following this post to point out that we did not acknowledge or discuss his platform in our comments. His platform is vague and does not focus on any real ‘tangibles’—things that he could concretely be held to if elected. Although this is pragmatic, and certainly a better position to be in once elected, from a voter’s perspective it is unideal. We respect the general intent of his platform points and the motivation behind them, but prefer candidates that have outlined more specific achievements intended for their term in office.

Vu also draws our attention to the many challenges he and his fellow VSEUS executives faced in the relatively unprecedented process of establishing a constituency. While these difficulties are relevant, they do not change our overall impression on the matter.

[iamablogubc]

Dear UBC Underground

Dear ubcunderground​,

We know too. Secret illuminati dance party?

(It's a good thing VFM can't be disqualified for slating, eh?)

[iamablogubc]

Endorsement: President

We're unsure how contested this race really is. Again, we dislike discounting candidates, but it seems a long shot to see past SUS President Aaron Bailey winning the race. Yet, we don't think his opponent, Cheneil Antony-Hale, should be taken as a token candidate. Speculation at the start of this race was that she was running for the role to make a point of certain issues on campus. We think that she's done much more.

Antony-Hale's platform has been, while perhaps somewhat focused on areas of affordability and other elements of social justice, reasonably diverse. She's picked some populist issues (e.g. legal protections for students in residences) and has by no means put herself forward as simply "the radical left candidate" (as we amusingly heard muttered of her more than a few times). We're sure her focus might fall more towards one side of the spectrum of issues the AMS faces, but we also think she would be a capable leader for AMS Council, the Executive Committee, and the AMS's administration. At the same time, she should have been more prepared in her campaign to step outside of the topics on which she is running, and be a part of the discussion on other issues relevant to the Presidency, such as the AMS's financial position. If she wants, ultimately, to be AMS President, then she should develop her experience more widely in the AMS (perhaps run in a constituency election as an AMS Representative) and try again in a year.

Bailey has no doubt been building up to this role for many years. He is, in truth, what we might consider AMS royalty—people who are expected to take on leadership roles, and to a certain extent, have those opportunities very clearly laid out to them (then again, as do most winning candidates in popularity contests). But Bailey is inescapably qualified to take on this role.

At the same time, we are left with a somewhat poor taste from one component of his campaign. His letter to the Ubyssey was as much grandstanding as anything. We feel this sort of cashing in on negative student sentiments towards student government is a bit of an easy way out and all too often simply builds on those sentiments, without ultimately doing much to reverse then. To us, not very Presidential. Bailey has served on AMS Council for the past two years, and cannot entirely absolve himself of the AMS's many flaws. His campaigning is no doubt a sign of her shrewd political aptitude. But as voters, we find a reservation on this one.

With two votes in favour, we endorse Aaron Bailey. Amongst the illuminati that we are, one vote went to Antony-Hale and another to "abstain."