Vote Kadakia, Bullock, Lettie Tuesday

A common theme has begun to emerge in our reactions to DSG: concern that elected officials have failed to convince the average Duke student that DSG is an organization working for their interests rather than for self-satisfaction. DSG works best when it serves as a conduit, relaying the ideas of the student body to the administration, rather than acting unilaterally. Likewise, DSG vice presidents are most effective when they listen to and inspire the senators that work in their committees rather than commanding them. In addition to heeding senators, though, a strong VP must ensure that external voices are recognized and that the ideas of those voices are implemented. To this end, we encourage voters to consider which candidates will encourage DSG to improve the interface between students, student government and administration so as to help DSG focus on issues the student body finds salient. Below are our VP endorsements.

Academic Affairs

With major changes coming to the Duke curriculum and advising systems, the VP for academic affairs will have the opportunity to reshape the Duke intellectual experience for incoming students. We feel that Kushal Kadakia is the best candidate to guide DSG through this exciting time and enthusiastically endorse his candidacy. We appreciated Kadakia’s emphasis on strengthening mentorship communities on campus like the peer adviser network and graduate-undergraduate mentoring partnerships. We also found his ideas for leveraging technology to increase DSG transparency to be compelling. While Kudakia’s competitor, Sean Bissell, demonstrated devotion to improving academic engagement, Kadakia presented a more nuanced understanding of what students need from DSG on academic affairs.

Equity and Outreach

The VP of equity and outreach frames the way that DSG interacts with the broader Duke community. We cautiously endorse Adam Bullock for this position on the basis of his strong platform which seeks to address previously ignored concerns, including the needs of low-income students. We were impressed by Bullock’s recognition and acknowledgement that DSG has often co-opted the ideas of other student organizations, stripping them of agency and his plans to counter this trend by connecting student groups directly to administrators. Our main concerns with Bullock lay in his nebulous plans for actually reaching those student groups. Bullock’s competitor, Riyanka Ganguly, made a strong case for her candidacy and has an exemplary history of advancing issues important to her, highlighted by her creation of the Sexual Health Resource Center. We were concerned, however, that Ganguly presented the kind of platform we have seen all too often from DSG candidates, with big ideas that had little buy-in from students at large. While rhetorically eloquent, Ganguly seemed too bureaucratically inclined to bridge the disconnect between DSG and the broader community.

Residential Life

The VP for residential life oversees all HDRL-related matters. Overall, we felt that Jacob Lettie laid out the best plan to improve the way that Duke students live on campus. We appreciated the emphasis that another candidate, Basil Seif, placed on expanding living learning communities and the recognition that competitor Eddy Torgas gave to community displacements caused by construction. Ultimately, however, Lettie presented the best plan to improve housing, especially for independent students, through a plan of revisions to blocking rules and student dorm choice.

Our endorsements for the positions of vice president of services, Durham and regional affairs, facilities and environment and social culture will be published in tomorrow's editorial.