For the love of the job

“I’m lucky to be able to say that we addressed nearly all of our major agenda items,” he said.

Within a tenure marked by several unprecedented achievements, Diemand-Yauman named pass/D/fail reform, the gender-neutral housing pilot project, the eating club task force, work done on grading policy and the reallocation of the USG’s Lawnparties concert money to the Pace Center as the USG’s greatest accomplishments.

Though he ran unopposed after serving five semesters as Class of 2010 president, Diemand-Yauman inherited a USG struggling with both internal clashes and external credibility issues. He began his term under the shadow of an elections scandal in which outgoing president Josh Weinstein ’09 sent an e-mail claiming that Diemand-Yauman had endorsed Michael Weinberg ’11, who won the election for vice president. The scheduled revote was subsequently cancelled.

“The e-mail scandal was tough for me because I knew that it was damaging the USG’s name and that I would ultimately be inheriting the controversy from the previous administration,” he said. “My main concern was that we were honest with students. After some of the incidents that surrounded the previous administration, people’s perceptions of the USG were understandably really low.”

But Diemand-Yauman had definite goals and high hopes for the coming year. From addressing grade deflation to advocating for changes to a state law, he wanted to enact policies that would tangibly improve student life.

Partnerships with administrators

The first step to accomplishing these goals was to build the USG’s rapport with both the administration and the student body.

“The administration was somewhat hesitant to engage with the USG” until the USG established itself as a “credible voice,” Diemand-Yauman said.

“We chose to focus on issues where the student voice was relevant, rather than fighting a hopeless battle against the administration,” Weinberg said in an e-mail.

In addition to improving relations with administrators, Diemand-Yauman said he worked to make the USG “much tighter” and less “top-heavy.”

To streamline a bureaucracy that had suffered from inefficiency and “in-fighting” in past years, he ushered through several constitutional reforms and organized USG members into working groups, rather than relying on the pet project system that had been in place.

The working group system “allowed the USG to focus simultaneously on a wide range of projects while promoting teamwork among the USG senators,” Michael Yaroshefsky ’12, current IT committee chair and Diemand-Yauman’s successor, said in an e-mail.

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With this restructuring, Diemand-Yauman embarked on several goals outlined for the USG. A year later, many of these goals have met with success.

Policy achievements

Part of this success was due to Diemand-Yauman’s realistic approach to USG projects, several administrators said.

“Every year we have USG presidents who say they’re going to do something about grade deflation, which usually means they will try to overturn it,” Diemand-Yauman said. “This strategy wasn’t working.”

Rather than attempting to abolish the unpopular policy, Diemand-Yauman instead worked with Dean of the College Nancy Malkiel to increase awareness of the University’s grading rules. The USG drafted a letter to the faculty clarifying the grading policy and noting that there is no strict cap on A-range grades. Diemand-Yauman also worked with Malkiel to create an online system allowing students to request that the University send letters to potential employers and graduate schools explaining the University’s grading policy.

Though the USG’s work on the grading policy stemmed from overwhelming concern expressed by the student body, Diemand-Yauman also achieved changes that reflected his personal investment in campus issues.

Work on one of his main priorities, addressing the relationship between the University and the eating clubs, resulted in the establishment of the eating club task force.

President Tilghman noted that the task force was a major project for both Diemand-Yauman and the University, crediting their spring discussions and continued work over the summer with allowing the task force to begin “rapidly” last fall.

Vice President and Secretary Robert Durkee ’69 lauded Diemand-Yauman’s contributions to the task force.

“I thought he did an exemplary job in helping to develop the charge to the task force and in identifying the other student members,” Durkee said in an e-mail. “He … played a leading role in creating the website through which the task force has solicited comments and then encouraging students to take advantage of this opportunity to comment.”

“The eating club task force is something I’m extremely proud of,” Diemand-Yauman said. “For the first time, we are elevating the discussion to a level it’s never been to before. We’re talking about the issues that students care about and with the people who can actually make real positive changes.”

Though Diemand-Yauman sought to address undergraduate concerns through the USG’s work, a referendum on the allocation of funds for the USG’s spring Lawnparties concert proved divisive.

A majority of students voted to reallocate the funds to the Pace Center in the spring 2009 ballot, but more than 1,000 students voted against the measure.

“The referendum, while a contentious, heated issue, was one of my proudest moments, not [just] as USG president but also as a Princeton student,” Diemand-Yauman said. “Students voted to give and to sacrifice in order to help others.”

“I simply gave students the choice,” he said. “While I very publicly supported donating the money, this decision was the student body’s, and that’s why I wanted to put it to a vote. At the end of the process, the students voted to donate the money, and I was very proud to be part of that group.”

Tilghman noted that the donation had a “significant impact” for the larger Princeton community. “I could go to alumni groups and parent groups and talk about Princeton’s responses to the financial crisis, which showed the students’ devotion to community service projects,” she explained.

Diemand-Yauman also noted that he believed the initiative helped achieve “a new level of USG financial transparency.”

During his tenure, Diemand-Yauman also worked to address the lack of clarity surrounding the University’s alcohol policy.

In September 2008, Borough police charged Diemand-Yauman with providing alcohol to minors after he called Public Safety seeking medical help for an intoxicated friend—an incident that highlighted the discrepancy between University policies and Borough laws.

As a first step, the USG distributed “alcohol business cards” informing students about University policies, which noted that “officers may lie to and pressure you.” Subsequently, the USG has reached out to students, administrators, politicians and leaders at other colleges. Diemand-Yauman also collaborated with the administration to try to influence alcohol amnesty legislation at the state level.

“In our — and certainly in Connor’s — view, this legislation was really flawed,” Tilghman said. “It was trying to accomplish the right thing, which is allowing students to help intoxicated friends, but it went about it the wrong way.”

Nevertheless, Diemand-Yauman called the 9-1-1 legislation “a great step in the right direction.”

“In the end, we were unsuccessful at getting it changed, but we gave it our best shot. And most importantly, we did it together rather than the students off doing one thing and the administration doing another,” Tilghman added.

On a local level, Diemand Yauman sits on the Borough’s Princeton Alcohol and Drug Alliance, where he said his involvement will “ensure that undergraduates have a more active voice in the discussions and implementation of policies enforced by the Borough.”

The final prong of his approach is to work with leaders at other colleges and universities.

“Over the past several months, I have been reaching out to student body presidents at universities across the state,” Diemand-Yauman said. “We are in the process of establishing a committee with these leaders to discuss the role of alcohol at our universities and hopefully make formal policy recommendations to legislators. It will be the first time the USG has gotten involved in these issues at this level.”

Reflections on leadership

After his tenure as USG president, administrators and colleagues alike praised Diemand-Yauman’s dedication.

“He has in fact accomplished important things that redound to the clear benefit of the undergraduate student body,” Malkiel said. “To my mind, that’s real leadership: responsive to student needs, clearheaded in identifying problems susceptible to constructive action, imaginative and creative in fashioning proposals for change, willing to partner with administrators to realize his goals.”

USG officers echoed Malkiel’s sentiments.

“I am grateful for the amount of freedom and encouragement Connor gave me to work on projects I enjoyed. I consider this — the propensity to empower and inspire rather than manage — to be the mark of a talented leader,” Yaroshefsky said.

“He’s super friendly, but still focused — ready to work and ready for any new suggestions that came his way,” Class of 2012 senator Julie Chang said.

Diemand-Yauman noted that the position of USG president comes with a “steep learning curve.”

“I had to learn really, really quickly, and my work on the USG really is entirely different from my work in class government. The leadership responsibility is magnified significantly,” he explained.

Diemand-Yauman noted that, though he is overhwlemingly satisfied with the USG’s work over the past year, he believes he could have “more pro-actively communicated the positive things the USG was doing for students.”

“I was never into the flashy e-mails,” he said. “I was never into trying to make the USG look cool. I don’t support a bread-and-circus government of giving away free cupcakes and gear to make people like us. I don’t think we need to pander to students in that way. Princeton students are too smart for that.”

Diemand-Yauman said he believes the USG’s success is measured by the results it produces.

“My philosophy has been that if we do good work and we’re honest about what we do, then the recognition will follow. From the beginning, I said that our results will speak for themselves, and if they don’t, then so be it. We can rest easy knowing that we did what we could and we did so with integrity.”

Looking back and looking forward

The end of his term as president will not mean an end to Diemand-Yauman’s involvement in the Princeton community, which he’s “fallen in love with,” he said. He will continue contributing to the eating club task force, performing with campus groups and working on “Own What You Think,” a campaign he founded to fight against anonymous character assassination.

Diemand-Yauman said he “hopes to run” for Young Alumni Trustee and intends to volunteer next year with the Global Literacy Project in St. Vincent and the Grenadines. He said he then plans to write and act on his own show on Korean PBS through the same educational content provider that employed him two summers ago.

Diemand-Yauman admitted that his job has involved an element of personal sacrifice and noted that he would easily spend 30 to 35 hours per week on his work. “But it’s no different than any other time-intensive student activity,” he said.

In the opinions of the people with whom he’s worked, Diemand-Yauman’s time was well spent.

“His most important legacy, and I think historically his most important legacy, was the opening up of a dialogue about eating clubs,” Tilghman noted. “It’s not so much the final outcome of the task force, but it’s the importance of our examining every aspect of the University from time to time. His leadership on this, no matter what the outcome, has been extraordinary.”

“Connor will be remembered for a number of successful projects, ranging from grading policy to gender-neutral housing,” Yaroshefsky said. “The successes of these projects resulted from combining Connor’s visionary energy with the dedication of the USG senators and the collaboration of administrators.”

Diemand-Yauman added that he has been involved with the USG for the same reasons he has been involved with activities like the Nassoons: because he loves it.

“In talking with some other USG presidents, I was worried because the job sounded daunting,” Diemand-Yauman said. “It seemed like an obligation, something you had to get through. I feel lucky because I’ve loved this job, and I feel so honored to have been given the opportunity to serve in this capacity at one of the best universities in the world.”