Shawon Jackson ’15: Spotlight on Service

USG president Shawon Jackson ’15 said he plans to promote accessibility, approachability and accountability for the USG this year, signaling that he would keep his campaign promises during his term.

“The theme for this year is ‘to lead is to serve,’ and that’s a quote from Elie Wiesel,” Jackson said. “We’re focusing on serving through leadership — serving the students, serving the administration and serving the community at large.”

With the help of vice president Carmina Mancenon ’14, Jackson said he hopes to make the USG an efficient and effective body of servant leaders who are easy to contact, welcoming and open to feedback.

“When people look back on Shawon’s term, I want them to be able to really see the passion that he put into it and know that truly, in everything he did, he really was looking toward trying to make the University a better place to live and be as a student,” Class of 2016 senator Eduardo Lima said.

The last student to become USG president as a sophomore was Michael Yaroshefsky ’12, who served for two terms. Jackson said he recently spoke to Yaroshefsky and that the former president gave him “good advice.”

“I think my term will be perhaps a bit different than Yaro’s,” Jackson said. “I think it will be the same in that Yaro also emphasized being an approachable organization that students can go to. I think a distinction would be just kind of that he was very, very big on academic policy.”

Jackson said his main policy would differ in that he plans to assess Frist Campus Center’s programming and the experience of low-income and minority students on campus.

He said he hopes to improve the social experience on campus by evaluating the campus center’s programming and recommending improvements. The USG approved the creation of an ad-hoc committee at its meeting on Sunday to begin the evaluation process.

Jackson said he plans to continue discussing the results of the COMBO III project that he led as a Class of 2015 senator and examine the experience of minority students on campus. He said he is also planning ahead for the COMBO IV survey, which will be distributed this spring.

Jackson said he has already spoken with the committee that will be working on the survey in order to avoid the extensive delays the USG encountered with COMBO III.

“We learned specifically what kind of data analysis we need and what kind of manpower we need to complete the report efficiently,” he said. “We have a more extensive timeline for COMBO IV … We also have a specific timeline for getting the data analysis done now that we know how long the data analysis actually takes.”

Jackson discussed plans to reform the academic calendar and change the pass/D/fail policy, which are the main policy goals of the USG’s academics committee.

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The leaders of the USG’s committees also indicated that they plan to continue previous initiatives and introduce new ones in the course of their terms.

Academics committee chair Dillon Sharp ’14 said the proposed changes to the P/D/F policy, which would give students the opportunity to view their final grade in a P/D/F-graded class and possibly rescind the P/D/F, will be voted on by the faculty committee in April and, if passed, could be put into effect next fall.

The committee also hopes to be able to modify the academic calendar in order to add the Wednesday before Thanksgiving to the break.

In addition to these initiatives, Sharp said he also hopes to improve aspects of the so-called shopping period, create a centralized way for students to find and join study groups and make it easier to reschedule final exams that take place within 24 hours of each other, among other items.

The social committee indicated that it plans to build on the success it had last year with the Silent Disco and the Hoodie Allen concert by creating and planning new social events in addition to the biannual Lawnparties and Dean’s Date events.

Social committee chair Carla Javier ’15 said the social committee hopes to create more interactive events, like a campus-wide video game tournament, and incorporate charity into future events.

“To follow with Shawon’s ‘to lead is to serve’ administrative goal, we want to do something charity related,” Javier said, noting that the social committee has the unique position to reach out to the entire student body and get the body energized about a particular cause. “These events would bring people together to socialize, and it would happen to benefit some kind of cause.”

Javier is a news writer for The Daily Princetonian.

The Campus and Community Affairs committee chair Trap Yates ’14 said he plans to continue former chair Mancenon’s successful projects, which include Tiger Deals and Restaurant Week, while also building on the annual Communiversity.

Though he said he is still thinking through the new initiatives he plans to bring to the CCA table during his term, Yates hopes to find ways for underclassmen to connect with upperclassmen and make Nassau Street more accessible to students at all times, rather than only during special promotional weeks.

Yates is a former associate editor for Street for the ‘Prince.’

After the University Student Life Committee was able to ensure gender-neutral housing in each of the residential colleges last month, chair Greg Smith ’15 said he hopes to be able to find a way to reduce Pequod pricing and put more readings on e-reserves.

“It’s been a long-term project that I would love to accomplish this year,” Smith said. “One of the main issues is that it has a lot of stakeholders on campus, so certainly I’ll continue to work on Pequods, but I think it’s something that might move into next year.”

The USLC also hopes to improve the dormitory placement system for students returning from a semester abroad and make it possible for students to be both Outdoor or Community Action leaders and residential college advisers.

“The chairs are really passionate about the positions they hold,” Jackson said. “I think I’ll be able to work in a mentoring role with them.”

In an effort to further build the rapport between members of the USG, Jackson and Mancenon implemented a new model of advising groups within the senate.

“It’s not just independent pockets of the senate who are working independently on their projects — you’re required to come together every couple of weeks and hear what else is going on and give feedback,” Jackson said.

Additionally, Mancenon hopes to meet with each member of the USG in two one-on-one meetings during the semester in order to give advice and make sure everyone feels comfortable.

Jackson and Mancenon will also hold office hours on Tuesday nights and encourage all undergraduate students to reach out to them with feedback, ideas or just to talk.

“I want the students to feel like it’s their USG, that we are serving them. We do what we do with the student body in mind,” Class of 2015 senator Deana Davoudiasl said. “A lot of the best ideas that we get that we pursue as projects are suggestions from students.”