Our Fast Four with the 2013 Student Association candidates

Student Association candidates answer key questions to help the SU community make its best-informed voting decision.
Cast your vote by logging into MySlice through Thursday.

Learn more about: Duane Ford and Nia Boles | Boris Gresely and Daniela Lopez | Ivan Rosales and Simone Goldslager

The NewsHouse: In one sentence, what is your platform?

Ford: My platform is tackling tuition, academic advising and diversity.

Boles: My platform would be connecting with the RSOs (registered student organizations) on campus, getting SA and the community involved into community service and giving back to the Syracuse community because they give so much for us and to us and to really utilize the diversity we have on campus.

---

The NewsHouse: What is the biggest goal you hope to achieve if elected?

Ford: My goal would be to, at the very least, make tuition transparent so that students know exactly and specifically where their money is going.


Boles: We definitely want to make diversity in action a campus-wide theme and a campus-wide initiative, very similar to Chancellor Cantor’s Scholarship in Action. … A huge goal of mine is to really make diversity active on campus.

---

The NewsHouse: What do you think your biggest hurdle or challenge is?


Ford: I think my biggest challenge would be getting every single SA member on the same page and every SA member buying into the things we want to do, and holding them all accountable.


Boles: I think my biggest challenge would definitely be not trying to do everything.

---

The NewsHouse: What do you most look forward to if elected?


Ford: What I most look forward to is being able to finally work on what I believe the Student Association should be working on… which are: tuition, academic advising and diversity.


Boles: I look forward to representing the students. Everything I do, everything I represent is about the student body, about servicing them. So I definitely look forward to being a role model for them and helping them resolve their problems, their issues. … I’m just like you – I'm your peer. We both want to see change happen on this campus.

---

The NewsHouse: In one sentence, what is your platform?


Gresely: It’s my slogan: an alliance for change. That is what we’re running with, that’s what we want to promote, because we really believe that having an alliance is how you really promote change.


Lopez: Our sentence would be trying to build an alliance for change.

---

The NewsHouse: What is the biggest goal you hope to achieve if elected?


Gresely: My biggest goal is making sure that we leave a precedent at SA: making sure that we are reconnected with the students, and that internally, SA is working well.


Lopez: The biggest goal is to bring different facets of students on campus together because we are all Syracuse University, whether you are abroad, whether you are physically here, whether you are in D.C., the LA campus, or even alumni: we all have that thing in common, and it’s we all love Syracuse.

---

The NewsHouse: What do you think your biggest hurdle or challenge is?


Gresely: I think the biggest challenge is definitely making sure that everyone understands what alliance of change is, and that is part of my transitional plan.


Lopez: The biggest challenge would probably be reaching out to the first-year students. One of our ideas is to form a dialogue group with them for the forum classes that we have.

---

The NewsHouse: What do you most look forward to if elected?


Gresely: What I look forward to is definitely inspiring and motivating people to support me. … I look forward to motivating more individuals, motivating the entire assembly to really tackle the big issues, but also understand that we all need to be on the same page and we are a team here.


Lopez: Just getting to know different people on campus. I’m really excited to meet different leaders, meet different people that I usually wouldn’t cross paths with. And I feel like that makes you learn more not only about other people but about yourself, too, because you might have things in common.

---

The NewsHouse: In one sentence, what is your platform?


Rosales: Our platform is tackling issues and topics that students genuinely care about with tangible and measurable results.


Goldslager: Our platform consists of three pillars and that is academic excellence, student engagement and diversity. All three of those really relate back to the students and ultimately will make students’ experience at Syracuse University better.

---

The NewsHouse: What is the biggest goal you hope to achieve if elected?


Rosales: When we leave office, we want to be able to see that we made your Syracuse experience better.


Goldslager: The vice president’s role right now is to work on our diversity pillar, so I’d just love to have a super successful multicultural diversity week.

---

The NewsHouse: What do you think your biggest hurdle or challenge is?


Rosales: The biggest challenge is that as we move forward, we keep hearing what students think is important and keep focusing on that, because sometimes that doesn't happen. You listen to students and you get elected, and then you think you don’t need to listen anymore. We’ll make sure we keep doing it. We'll make time for students and we'll make time to hear what's important to you.


Goldslager: I think that my biggest challenge will just be kind of moving from the leadership roles that I’ve already established myself in on campus to this different one.

---

The NewsHouse: What do you most look forward to if elected?


Rosales: What I look forward to is just starting to construct my cabinet, and that group that we are going have each other’s backs 100 percent. … I’m just excited to start.


Goldslager: I ultimately look forward to meeting all different students across campus and actually getting the opportunity to talk to them about what they think would make the university a better place.