Meet your 2018–2019 ASUWT candidates

This week is election week for the Associated Students of UW Tacoma. There are currently 17 students cam­paigning for positions in the senate and Executive Board, which includes the president position. The students elected will represent the entire student body for next school year. Voting officially opened 12:01 a.m. April 30 and closes 11:59 p.m. May 4. Students can vote online through DawgDen.

Students were invited to come meet their candidates at an open public forum in the Dawg House April 24 and April 25. Coffee and donuts were served, and students could ask questions and have conversations with the candidates.

This election season, many of the candidates are focusing their attention towards common complaints and con­cerns about the UWT campus. Problems mentioned during the public forums included the lack of parking spaces and having to pay for parking, increasing on-campus meal options, needing more transparency between students and the administration, promoting cross-campus unity and actively encouraging student engagement on campus.

Something unique to this year’s elec­tion is not one but two groups of students are running together on a shared “ticket.” Each ticket is headed by an ASUWT presidential candidate: Armen Papyan and Connor Myers.

“Our team is very experienced,” Pa­pyan said. “We come from different backgrounds all across campus. We’ve all worked on and are continuing to work on alleviating the problem with parking, as well as connecting the student body with local and state officials.”

Papyan’s ticket — running together under the motto of “Collectively Empow­ered” — includes Christie Peralta, April Lai, Araik Papyan, Diana Algomeda, Shooq Alhathelool, Julia Kilcup, Matthew Park and Hanan Gumale.

On the second ticket, Myers is run­ning his campaign along with Naga Pa­lepu and Malik Webster. Together, these three are running under the motto of “Husky Voices.”

“We are working together to help make sure students have their voices heard,” Myers said. “Seeing how well the late night study pilot program has been going shows that change is possible, and students’ voices can be heard and can make a difference!”

Candidates decorated the sidewalks around UWT with chalk and have been putting up flyers and posters promoting their campaigns. While the official start of open campaigning was April 18, stu­dents have been working since the begin­ning of April to prepare their platforms and get endorsements from student or­ganizations.

While there are 17 candidates run­ning, not every position is being filled. There are five positions where student write-ins can decide who will fill the spot for next year. Those positions are: Urban Studies Senator, Information Technol­ogy Senator, two Undeclared Senators and the Education Senator.

ASUWT Positions & Their Candidates

PRESIDENT
Connor Myers
Armen Papyan

DIRECTORS

Finance: April Lai

Internal Affairs: Diana Algomeda

Legislative Affairs: Naga Palepu
& Ara Papyan

Outreach: Maxine Filcher, Matthew
Park & Malik Webster

Student Technology: Shooq Alhathelool

University Affairs: Christine Peralta

SENATORS

Business: Julia Kilcup
& Katrina Miyamoto

Healthcare Leadership: Angeline Jimenez

Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences: Maria
Crisostomo & Hanan Gumale

Social Work: Karen Martinez

To learn more about the candidates, visit
tacoma.uw.edu/associatedstudents-universitywashington-tacoma-asuwt/run-asuwt