Three new execs elected in PIDSSA by-election
Jesse Mellott | Fulcrum Staff
THE POLITICAL, INTERNATIONAL, and Development Studies Student Association (PIDSSA) recently held a by-election to fill positions on its executive board. The positions up for grabs were first year representative, vp public administration, and vp social (francophone), with Patrick Morris, Erik Koskela, and Caroline Brouilette, winning the spots, respectively.
Simon Larivée, the president of PIDSSA, was encouraged by the results of the election and was excited to work with the new executive members.
“They all seem really enthusiastic about the job,” said Larivée. “They have already been emailing me to know more about it, so I am really pumped for that.”
Larivée said he hopes to outline with the new executives what is expected of them and what it will take to be successful in their new positions.
Patrick Morris was elected to the position of first year representative. Morris is in a combined honours in political science and juris doctorate in common law program.
Morris said he has always been interested in student politics, which led to his decision to run for the position.
“I have always been extremely active in co-curricular [activities] and student government,” said Morris. “Representing students is something that interests me, and it’s something that I have a lot of experience with. I could not come to university and not get involved.”
In addition to wanting to be involved in student government, Morris would also like to see more first years getting involved on campus.
“One of the main points of my platform, was to increase engagement of first year students,” said Morris. “Looking civically, academically, and in terms of social events as well.”
Caroline Brouilette, who is currently in her fourth year of international studies and modern languages, was elected as vp social (francophone) while running unopposed. She was previously involved in PIDSSA last year as a volunteer, and wants to get students more engaged with PIDSSA activities.
“One of my tasks is to help the integration of Francophones.” Brouillette explained, “There are a lot of Francophones that are intimidated, and for some reason don’t get involved. I would really like to help them get involved.”
Erik Kolskela, who is in his third year of political science and public administration, won the position of vp public administration. He expressed interest in the same areas as the other new execs: helping students and organizing activities.
“I want to be able to engage students and get more people involved,” said Koskela. “I also want to be able to plan a few public administration related social events. I want to be able to help students get more involved in the community, especially in a degree like public administration. I really want to get to know a lot more people, bring a lot more people together. [Try to] build a bigger community within public administration. I find that especially in the upper years it becomes a really tight-knit community, and I really think that’s good to start to build that sooner. I really want to work on bringing everyone together.”
PIDSSA was founded in 1992 as the Political Science Student Association, and has 19 members on its executive, including the three that were just elected.
