Candidates for the 2023 Associated Students (A.S.) election participated in a virtual forum hosted by The Corsair on Tuesday morning.

On Tuesday, April 4, candidates for the Santa Monica College (SMC) Associated Students (A.S.) were invited to an online Candidate Forum on Zoom hosted by The Corsair.

The forum was moderated by Corsair Editor-in-Chief Sasha Funes and Managing Editor Conor Heeley. Candidates were given two minutes to answer each question, and touched upon issues concerning student outreach, accessibility of student resources and the on-campus publicity of A.S.

The A.S. is the student-run government of SMC with the goal of representing the interests of the student body. There are currently 14 students running for 10 A.S. leadership positions. Four of these positions are contested, which include the A.S. President, Director of Basic Needs, Director of Instructional Support, and Director of Publicity.

The remaining six positions — Secretary, Director of Student Outreach, Director of Equity and Diversity, Director of Student Affairs, Director of Sustainability, and Student Trustee — feature only one candidate.

Every candidate was emailed an invitation link for the forum, but only a handful attended. According to Funes, candidates were emailed in advance regarding the candidate forum multiple times. Four out of the 14 candidates appeared: Cecilia Jeong and Justin Liu for A.S. President, Doris Huang for Director of Student Outreach, and Lina Fuellemann for Director of Publicity.

Candidates remained civil and agreed with each other’s responses on the need for greater awareness in A.S. events and resources. This was in stark contrast to the Spring 2022 virtual forum, in which the previous presidential candidates lobbed criticisms and accusations at one another.

The candidates spoke on the importance of making the student body aware of A.S. events and school resources. Jeong proposed increasing the presence of Bodega, the on-campus food pantry, on satellite campuses with additional centers.

“If you're a student parent, if you are a full time worker, and you're also a full time student … you need to keep yourself well fed,” said Jeong. “You can't risk your health for the sake of education.”

Liu said that the SMC website needs to be more accessible, because many students have trouble efficiently navigating the site. He also suggested educating student clubs more on the funding process.

“This is something that we definitely would have to improve to ensure that we serve — as a whole board, serve in students' best interest,” said Liu.

On the topic of equity and diversity, the candidates agreed on further promoting the A.S. through their many social media platforms, such as Facebook and Discord channels.

“We really need to promote information through every platform we have, so we make sure we try our best to deliver our message,” said Huang.

Huang brought up the idea of surveys and responding to online questions on social media, and Jeong suggested merchandise incentives such as hoodies to catch students’ attention. Liu said he would collaborate with the Director of Activities to organize events on satellite campuses during the Activity Hour, which is Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays from 11:15 a.m. to 12:45 p.m.

Fuellemann suggested that SMC professors notify their students of A.S. and its benefits. She added that if professors brought up A.S. in the beginning of a semester, it would be very effective.

“People can hear about the A.S., but most of the people don't even know what it is,” said Fuellemann. “If a professor would talk about it, I feel like people will really take it serious and be like, ‘oh, OK, this is like a good thing to do and be part of.’”

The election opened voting on Monday, April 3 at midnight, and the virtual polls will close on Thursday, April 6 at 11:59 p.m. The results will be announced in the A.S. Election Committee meeting on Friday, April 7 at 1:30 p.m. Students can log in to their Corsair Connect account and click on the animated banner at the top of the page to begin voting.

The full recording of the forum can be watched on The Corsair’s YouTube channel, TheCorsairOnline.

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