Earlier last week, the Watchdogs Gazette team of editors and staff writers reached out to every running USFC candidate (to the best of our knowledge) and requested an interview with them. The aim of our work is to familiarize the student body with their potential USFC members. Below are transcripts of the interviews with the candidates who were available throughout the week to have these conversations about their campaign. We’ve also enclosed the names of those who we were unable to interview, and we hope that their platforms are exposed to you in some other way.
The central questions that we worked around were the following:
- Why did you decide to run?
- If you weren’t running for elections what would you look for in a candidate and on what basis would you decide who to vote for?
- If you had to summarize your campaign by 3 goals you hope to achieve by the end of this academic year, what would they be?
Naturally, the questions were expanded upon by the writers to gain a more holistic view of their campaign, and each in their own way.
We hope these interviews help you in choosing your votes and urge you again to not be pressured into giving your vote away.
Hieba Annan, Editor in Chief.
Disclaimer: the interviews were edited, translated at points, and shortened for clarity.
1) Nagib Saab
Campus Choice
Why did you decide to run?
First of all, I decided to run because last year I was an SRC, and I already had experience. Apart from that, as an SRC, I got to see what the USFC work is like. I also got to see that the council is pretty dysfunctional. And I was one of the few SRC’s who actually worked. The change that happened in the faculty was because of me. Even if it was not much, it was something I did single handedly. Why are you running with Campus Choice in specific? I’ve been a part of the Secular Club since I was a freshman, I’m a senior now. I ran with them last year, and I’m running with them this year too, because I believe that it is necessary for there to be a non-politically affiliated entity on campus for students to vote for. Because, in the end, people who are politically affiliated tend to ask people to vote for them because they’re from the same party/sect/religion, and I’m against that. Even if we don’t end up getting the seat, I feel like it’s my duty to run for Secular. I feel it’s important to make a change, even a change as small as running for the student council in university.
If you weren’t participating in elections, what would you look for in a candidate?
First of all, I look for a platform in a candidate, because most end up not having a platform. I would also like to know about their background and if they’ve been active in university, and even if they haven’t I’d want to know that, all in all, they take student life seriously. It goes against my morals to vote for someone that is politically affiliated. So, what I look for in a candidate is someone who is both willing to work and isn’t politically affiliated.
What do you hope to achieve by the end of this year?
There’s a lot of SRC work that we weren’t able to do last year, because of some complications in the faculty. First of all, there are some things I’d like to change in FHS, as most of the focus is on FAS and the bigger faculties. There are some things that weren’t addressed last year by the USFC and should be addressed, like the changes in tuition. Apart from that, anything else that the students would like for us to change. Could you summarize your campaign by listing 3 goals? First, the tuition. Second, I’d like to change the way elections work in FHS in a way that there is equal representation for all the majors. In my faculty, there are 5 majors. Mine is medical audiology and most of the representation is of one or two majors at most. Every year, the SRC’s are mostly composed of medical lab students. So, we’d want to make sure that each major has their own representative. Lastly, I’d like to change other things, like when they made the main gate 24 hours rather than the medical gate, which doesn’t make sense since it leads directly to AUBMC in case of emergency, and so on. It’s a matter that concerns the safety of the students.
2) Sally Mahmoud
Independent
Tell me about yourself and why you decided to run for USFC.
So first off, my name is Sally Mahmoud, I am a junior in the FHS faculty. Last year, I ran for elections as SRC, and currently I am the class representative. My friends, classmates and certain students in my faculty motivated me to run for the elections because they saw my hard work. I want to enhance different areas in FHS including the lounge as well as the area in front of Van Dyck, as well as renovate the computer labs. I also want to improve the current curriculum and reflect students’ interests and concerns especially the ones related to the flexibility of the general education courses. FHS students do not have free electives. Why do students in FAS have the right to register for free electives? It is unfair. In addition, I would like to revive the role of FHS societies. We need to explain to our students what they are supposed to take and the grades that will help them get into European or American universities. And also, I want to implant a student-to-student advising program. Advisors do not always pass through the experience that students pass through. If I pass through a certain experience and I don’t do well, I want to advise it to other students. I want to enhance the communication channels between student and the university on one hand, and representatives on the other hand. If I was elected as USFC, it is important to have office hours. My role is to represent the students in the best image that they wish for.
I am running independently. Running independent and running through a political party is actually the same. This political party, when you win, will not change anything for you. I just ran independent to exclude myself from these political parties. And to be precise, it is all the same conclusion, I will be a UFSC despite how I decide to run.
If you weren’t running, what would you look for in a candidate?
They need to be a hard worker. I can say I want to do a lot of things, but after the elections, they need to be done with hard work. It’s what lets you stand out.
If you had to summarize your campaign by 3 goals you’d like to achieve by the end of the year, what would they be?
As I said, it’s all in the platform that I mentioned before. I am looking forward to achieving all these goals, not just 3 of them. Our faculty needs a lot of renovation and improvement.
3) Samia Habli
Campus Choice
Why did you decide to run this year, and why did you run with the Secular Club?
Before I came to AUB, I did my undergrad in the US. I’d always follow up with Lebanese news and feel like all of these great things are happening. All these people working to change something, and I was far away from that. That’s part of the reason I came to AUB for my graduate studies. While being here, I thought this would be a great opportunity to immerse myself in student life and see what are the issues that we are dealing with. I do the best with what I have to try to make a change. The people from the secular club were some of the first people I met at the faculty of undergrads. I learned more about the club, and it was a great fit to my values, what I care about, and what I would like to see happen in AUB and our country in general.
If you weren’t running for elections, what would you look for in a candidate and on what basis would you decide who to vote for?
I’d look at their values, what they stand for. Those are going to dictate what decisions they make, what proposals they’re going to want to put out, and how they’re going to treat people.
I’d look at how prepared they are, do they have a platform like the Secular Club has? What is their history? Whether its them as individuals or the club they belong to, whether they have a good track record of achieving what they say they’re going to do. When they’re held accountable, how do they deal with it? Does it matter who they’re running with? Yes, it does because the platform that you put forward represents you, including what your plans are and how people are going to hold you accountable for those things. And I think this is a big misunderstanding or a myth – when you ask people who they’re going to vote for and they tell you, “I’m going to vote for this person because they’re nice”, “I’m going to vote for this person because I’ve never seen them do anything bad,” maybe as a person they’re amazing, but then as part of a group, their policies are racist or exclusive. Because at the end of the day, even if you do vote for one representative, they report back to the group that they belong to and that’s how they cast their vote. That’s how they’re going to speak publicly, whether condemning or condoning it. So, it’s important, they’re both important– who the person is and the group they identity with because they both reflect on each other.
Can you summarize your campaign in 3 goals that you’d achieve by the end of the year?
Excellent education, social justice, accountability and democracy. So, for better education, we’re working on increasing communication between professors and students, and how students can learn better whether its accommodations or methods of teaching that are engaging and up to date. When we talk about accountability, it includes accountability of the colleges’ responsibility towards the students and ensuring they’re learning and being treated fairly. For democracy, it’s about making decisions, because every person has something to say. We should especially listen to those who have been made to feel that their voice does not matter. Social justice is the heart and soul of everything that we do, everything that I do as a person. That’s kind of why I fell into the Master of Public Health program, because it aligns with my beliefs and what I want to see on campus, whether its gender equality, LGBTQ+ rights, the rights of migrant workers on campus, etc. So, all of these are the compass that guides the things that we do and a lot of how we assess situations and tackle them.
Candidates we were unable to interview
4) Rayan Abdallah
Independent
