Though nominations will not be made until April 14, juniors Alison Clarke and Melissa Carson have come forth as the likely candidates for the Tufts Community Union (TCU) Presidency. Carson serves as vice president of the Senate and Clarke is the vice chair of the TCU Judiciary.
Although the election would pit a student government insider against a judiciary member with no formal experience on the Senate, the two are striking a similar tone at this early date.
Both Clarke and Carson said the Senate needs to improve its overall communication with the larger community next year. Though current president Eric Greenberg ran on the platform of "bringing it to the people," the two said that the Senate had a long way to go despite improvements in outreach.
"The Senate needs a fresh perspective this year. It hasn't been as productive as it could have been, and I just think it could use a perspective change," Clarke said.
"I don't think Eric brought anything to the people," Carson said. "I want to challenge senators to attend meetings of groups they don't belong to; we have to be willing to go outside our comfort zones."
Carson said the recent TCU e-mail list she worked to develop marked a strong step towards increasing the Senate's contact with students. Too often, she said, senators and presidents have not contacted students enough after elections.
"It's important for the president to stay flexible. It's easy to lay out in April what your priorities are going to be, but if things change you have to be flexible," she said. "The e-mail list is allowing senators to reach students across so many lines... it's an incredible start."
Though she acknowledged that previous senators had made the same campaign promises, Clarke said she was committed to improving the Senate's outreach. She said strengthening the public relations and student outreach committee, increased polling of students, and following through on outreach efforts could be better.
"[The Senate] doesn't do much outreach, or as much as it says it will," she said. "The only way you're going to be able to truly represent the people who elected you is to know what they want."
One of the most hotly contested issues recently has been the culture representative amendment. Passed last year, it allowed culture reps - elected by their respective groups - to vote in the Senate. A proposed amendment would strip the reps of their vote and place them and other interested students as part of a non-voting culture lobby.
Though both oppose the proposed amendment, they have different reasons for their lack of support. Clarke said she and other students are working on a different system to be introduced next year in which reps would have the right to vote, while addressing many of student and senator concerns. Citing the situation's complicated nature, Clarke declined to elaborate any further on the current system.
Carson said she has worked against the passage of the amendment because she believes the culture reps deserve consistent access to the Senate. She said that the sponsors of the amendment had "carefully marketed" it so students would not realize it stripped culture reps of their vote and gave other groups rights they essentially already had, in terms of access to the Senate.
"All it does is enumerate rights people already have," Carson said. "So many times we just relaxed the discussion into a dialogue out of respect for the people to come see us."
Carson said she is running because the Senate has consumed a large part of her time, and she wanted to make life better for students at Tufts.
"The Senate and Tufts itself have become my life. I've become very engrossed in making it the best place for students," she said. "It has a lot of potential that it's not living up to."
One of her biggest priorities will be identifying sources of money for student activities. A current member of the Budget and Priorities Committee, she said that the committee had a "tremendous" lack of contact with the community, which was aggravated because faculty members have always outnumbered student representatives.
"The committee has no bylaws. There's no guarantee that students who want to be heard are heard," said Carson. "There were times when we didn't have time to meet with people and wouldn't even accept written statements."
Clarke said the outside perspective she would bring to the Senate would prove beneficial. Though she's been involved with the workings of the Senate, she has not served as a senator.
"I'm not doing this for myself," she said. "A lot of senators get on four-year tracks and think about where they want to move up to, and that makes it hard for them to think about what they're working on in the present."
Clarke is a psychology and Spanish major. She is co-president of the Psychology Society, a coordinator of AIDS outreach, and has written for the Observer.
Carson majors in child development and philosophy, and is part of the Senate's Culture, Ethnicity and Community Affairs committee. She is also a member of the Leonard Carmichael Society and Hillel.
