Greeting T-birds!
As December begins to cast a chill over the Arizona desert, it heralds another amazing Fall trimester coming to an end. And with the end of this trimester, my term as the President of TSG also comes to an end. This is the last time I will be addressing all you wonderful people with my boring articles (I know how boring I can be!). I must confess that writing articles isn’t one of the better skills I possess but just addressing you has given me a high that I will never be able to recreate. I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of you for all the support you have shown me this trimester and thereby making my job as TSG President that much smoother.
This trimester the TSG has worked on numerous issues and have met most of the goals that we set out to achieve at the beginning of the trimester. Some of our key goals were:
- Improved communication to the student body: As high level as this goal is, it was also really challenging. We decided to start off by using Das Tor as the hub for conveying information to the student body and started bridging gaps between Das Tor and the TSG. The unprecedented success of Das Tor has helped us achieve this goal to a great extent. Thanks to the Das Tor team for making this happen. You guys are the BOMB!
- Promote the TSG and negate the “What IS TSG?” question: A LOT of students weren’t aware of the existence of the TSG, and we wanted to change this. With the Know Your TSG initiative, we have reached out to a lot more students than we previously did in communicating who holds what chair and what they are responsible for.
- CMC – TSG Liaison: As surprising as it is, the TSG has never had a CMC liaison. When Nikhil and I took over the TSG leadership, our first initiative was to create a chair that would be in constant interaction with the CMC and understand what both parties, the students and the CMC, need from each other. With the addition of the Student Affairs chair we were able to do this and believe that we have been able to better represent the student body to the CMC and vice-versa.
- Ask TSG: The Ask TSG initiative, according to me, was one of the most important TSG initiatives that we took up. Students were able to reach out to us with ease about their concerns and we directed it to the right people within the administration, faculty and staff. By ensuring that we addressed every issue at the TSG public meetings, we were able to achieve the opitimal solutions to student concerns. There are few issues that could not be solved in a short time frame but that doesn’t mean we haven’t been working on it. We have resolved more than 90% of the ASK TSG issues raised this trimester, which I as the leader of the team am extremely proud of.
- Improving Regional nights: I liked the way one of the students defined the regional nights in Das Tor’s TSG feedback article. She called it “the crowning jewel” of the TSG and it definitely is. This year we wanted to add more to the offering and that’s how the photo booth concept came up. A lot of students have come up to me and told me how much they liked the idea as they get to take a piece of the regional night back with them.
- Improving Thunderbird’s image with the Glendale Police Department: Due to certain actions by a small group of students in previous trimesters, the Glendale PD had certain reservations about the student body. The TSG reached out to the Glendale PD inviting them to visit the campus and meet the students here so that they can better understand what an amazing group of students we are. With the “Coffee With The Cop” initiative we were able to create a relationship with the PD and they were so impressed with us that they will be visiting the campus every month from next trimester to chat with us and students, and to listen to our issues.
There have been certain initiatives that we wanted to take up but couldn’t because of various reasons. Some of them are as below:
- The 4 city Student Contest: Because of certain timing constraints and logistics issue we had to shift the 4 city student contest, where 4 winners would be flown to 4 international Laureate locations, to the next trimester. We will keep you updated about the contest and I am sure the next leadership will work closely on it.
- ‘The Greentree issue”: A few students who had lived in Greentree Apartments had come to us with an issue that the apartment complex had charged them of certain funds that weren’t part of the initial contract. We are still working on this issue by collecting more information to better understand the contract. We will have an answer by the beginning of the next trimester.
The honor of holding the position of TSG President is, and will always be one of the most prestigious honors. I want to thank my awesome team for supporting me through out the trimester and working tirelessly to have a successful TSG. A big thank you to all you, my peers, for the unconditional support and love you have showed me. This will always remain extremely close to my heart.
With that here is wishing all you guys the best of luck for your exams! Best of luck to everyone who will be graduating. See you all at the Global Gala!
Cheers,
Abhishek
TSG President – Fall 2013.