USG hopefuls outline visions for academics, student life

Five hours before plastering the campus with fliers bearing their names and visages at the 12:01 a.m. start of campaigning, U-Council and class officer candidates presented their views last night at the USG candidates' forum.

With no students except USG officials and hopefuls in attendance, those at the biannual USG rite spoke primarily to the Tigervision camera. Candidates delivered what has become a standard recitation of student concerns — including calls for increased student group funding, better academic advising and greater celebration of diversity — and pledged to continue the fight for those goals if elected.

U-Council candidate Tom Vessella '01, for example, argued that Richardson Auditorium should host more student performances to help combat a theater-space shortage. "From Expressions to P-SAT, our best campus performing arts groups are being constantly relegated to" inadequate residential college black box theaters, he said.

Some students — mostly fresh voices to the USG like U-Council candidates Deborah Brundage '03 and Erez Lieberman '02 — proposed new ideas. Brundage suggested providing a University shuttle to nursing homes and other volunteer sites, while Lieberman recommended hiring faculty to teach introductory courses based on their teaching skill and not their research experience.

Incumbents, however, were able to point to their USG accomplishments. U-Councilors Dok Harris '01 and Jim DeRose '01 trumpeted the two television shows they started on Tigervision. "A year ago, the idea of student programming on the blue channel, Tigervision, was inconceivable," DeRose said.

U-Council chair Teddy Nemeroff '01 — whose speech was read by USG president PJ Kim '01 because he could not attend the forum — highlighted his efforts to launch the Sustained Dialogue on Race Relations, a project he said is still in its infancy. "The focus of my term would be to expand Sustained Dialogues and make it a permanent part of this campus," he pledged.

Several USG officials said they were pleased that 20 students are running for the 10 U-Council seats, after a lack of interest last year forced the USG to extend the deadline for declaring candidacy. Candidate speeches indicated that increased interest in the U-Council reflects both satisfaction and disillusionment with the USG.

U-Council candidates Vikas Khanna '02 and Vessella said the USG should be more aggressive in advocating students' interests. "I don't feel they have gone far enough," Khanna said. He added that students want a 24-hour study space and oppose anti-grade inflation measures and additional Friday classes, concerns that should not be "ignored but fought for in the presence of the administration."

Several student government hopefuls, however, praised the USG and Visions of Princeton — an online survey of students' interests. "Visions of Princeton was a good way to reach out to a lot of the student body," U-Council candidate Shaka Smith '03 said, when asked about what parts of the student body may have been overlooked by the USG.