Junior TCU Senators Rafi Goldberg and Jeff Katzin were nominated as candidates for TCU President last night. The nominations mark the first step towards the April 20 presidential elections.
Goldberg and Katzin were the only two candidates nominated in a procedure that is essentially a formality, amounting to a vote of confidence from the TCU Senate body.
The proceeding did, however, give the candidates an opportunity to formally present their platforms to fellow senators before the open presidential debate on Tuesday, April 19.
Katzin, an Economics major and current TCU Treasurer, spoke first, with an introduction of his slogan: "Making JUMBO Changes," and the plan that goes along with it. The acronym JUMBO stands for "Jobs, Unite campus communities, Money, Better campus housing and Open up technology."
Specifically, Katzin said he wants to establish a Council of Presidents to help facilitate communication between campus student groups and create ways of working together more effectively, such as a universal campus calendar.
He said he also would like to see the TCU Senate work more actively to help improve the perception of Greek life on campus. "The biggest problem of the Greek community is the perception of the Greek community," Katzin said.
Katzin said he wants to make sure that the positive contributions of Greek organizations gain sufficient publicity, possibly in the form of a Greek community newsletter highlighting recent achievements.
Housing was another issue Katzin brought up in his presentation to the TCU Senate. "If you ask most students the biggest problem with Tufts, it will often be campus housing," he said. Katzin said the housing lottery system should be adjusted and that the new Sophia Gordon Hall should be for juniors and seniors only, to provide a sense of on-campus upperclassmen community - something that he said he feels is lacking.
With regard to financial issues, Katzin, as acting TCU Treasurer, emphasized two things: a push to establish a reduced tuition plan where second semester seniors can pay on a class-by-class basis if they have met their graduation requirement by the fall, and a raise in the Student Life Fund, which would be partially financed by a proposed three-dollar raise in the Student Activities Fee. According to Katzin, the latter would make co-sponsorship of events much easier for student groups.
Goldberg's presentation centered on his TCU Tomorrow Plan, which concentrates on three issues that he sees as key for the future development of Tufts.
The first of these is Goldberg's initiative to create a summer internship stipend program similar to the current Summer Scholars program that allows students to conduct research projects in the summertime.
The program would provide stipends for Tufts students working in unpaid internship positions and would be financed through an endowed fund that would start at approximately $4 million, making around $200,000 a year available for stipends.
Goldberg said he believes this is achievable through fundraising directed at large businesses which would gain the benefit of recruiting easily at Tufts - all for the cost of a one-time donation.
Goldberg's second proposal is to institute a system that would mandate each department to place a greater emphasis on public speaking skills. "We're going to make sure every student who leaves Tufts can communicate all the great things they know," Goldberg said.
Instead of establishing a public speaking class, Goldberg said he hopes to increase public speaking skills by encouraging each department to consider the oral presentation demands of the classes it offers and make at least one of these classes a part of the distribution requirements for their majors.
Goldberg's final proposal was for greater administrative awareness of bias incidents on campus. "It's not a point of shame to acknowledge that sometimes people say hateful things," he said. Goldberg also said that, if he is elected TCU Senate president, he can urge the school to "hold up a mirror to the student body."
Goldberg said that he doesn't think that incidents of bias are a problem on campus relative to other colleges, but he does believe that they have been largely "swept under the rug" for years, leaving a "bitter taste in the mouths" of targeted groups.
Both of the candidates said they are confident that their proposals will have some precedent and support among the Tufts community. The main difference between Goldberg and Katzin are what policies they emphasize and how they intend to use the presidential position to achieve their goals.
If elected president, Goldberg said that the most effective use of his time would be to support large-scale initiatives such as his summer internship stipend program, that he said would need the support of the TCU Senate president to achieve fruition.
Several times throughout the meeting, Katzin said that his overriding goal is to achieve concrete, tangible results - the effects of which may hopefully be seen by the student body. "Everything we talked about tonight is a great idea," he said. "But it's about following through and completion."
