UCLA is in many ways a curious place. It appears to be teeming
with people, and at the same time, it’s a commuter campus
where people close their books or laptops and head for the parking
lot at 6 p.m. It has a large population of intelligent and aware
graduate and professional students but lacks even the most basic
social facilities for them to meet and mix in a cross-disciplinary
context. It is located in a major metropolis but suffers from
suburban neurosis rather than urban stress. One of the few
organizations that embodies something like a cross-section of the
graduate population at UCLA is the Graduate Student
Association.
I believe that one of the most important things GSA can do, if
it deploys its limited resources effectively, is to counter the
pressures of departmental tribalism and mutual lack of concern.
There are a number of serious issues facing grad students, both
here at UCLA and on the other UC campuses. Some of them are in the
future, but others are here already. Whether it’s the
significant expansion in undergraduate admissions coming with Tidal
Wave 2 or the current problems in the medical school, the
implications are a shadow over graduate and professional studies in
general, not just over South Campus or North Campus, department X
or program Y.
If elected GSA president, I want to use those resources we have
““ and any new resources we can create ““ to, first,
bring graduate and professional students from all over UCLA
together on key issues, second, to get the message across that
representation is only effective if people do not allow themselves
to be divided, and finally to help GSA make a more attractive
contribution to the cultural and social life of UCLA’s
graduate and professional student body.