Working Together Candidate: Camilla Tapp

Experience

• Serves on Arthur Mauro Students’
  Association council, UMSU council
• Sits on UMSU health and dental,
  finance, policy and bylaws, and
  travel grant subsidy committees
• Experience in event planning
  
  Why did you decide to run?
  Previously, I have been involved with the Arthur Mauro Students’ Association council. I’m the UMSU rep on that and I have also been on UMSU committees, and so I felt that this year was a great time to step up my involvement and give back to students and take on a larger role in the union.

What do you think the role of UMSU is on the U of M campus?
I think the role UMSU plays on campus is really a connection between admin and students. It’s working with students to get their needs across to admin and government to make changes that can really impact student life.

What kind of relationship do you hope to have with university administration?
I think that the relationship with admin is a very important one. They need to be able to listen to students and respond accordingly. It is very important to work together for students. That is a key that is easy to lose, but is very important to maintain and very important to be strong because it is working together with administration to get students needs met.

Get More candidate: Delaney Coelho

Experience

• Was executive on Resident Students’
  Association
• Volunteers for Praxis
• Participated on Arts Student Body
  Council, Undergraduate Political
  Studies Students’ Association
• Recently finished internship in
  Hondura funded by federal government
  
  Why did you decide to run?
  I’ve been involved all over this campus, and there are lots of things I love about this campus, but there were also some things I wasn’t happy about. I felt that I was in a position with this really great group of people, and I thought that if there was a time that we were going to step up and actually try to make a difference on this campus, it was now.

What do you think the role of UMSU is on the U of M campus?
I can’t speak for the UMSU in the past, but if I’m elected as president, I think my role is to be the voice for all students, not just a select group of students — students who are typically more engaged or involved. [ . . . ] All around campus we have communities of unique individuals. The science students have different needs then the arts students, or the engineering students, or the architecture students. We want to target those unique qualities in each faculty and department and see what we can do for those unique groups, instead of treating them all the same, because their needs are very different.

What kind of relationship do you hope to have with university administration?
I think to be effective in dealing with the administration you need to put your issues into their language. I believe that if I was elected president, I would be a good representative of students by not catering to the administration’s requests but sitting down at the table and talking to [the administration] as a reasonable, educated adult — by speaking in their language and still getting the students’ messages across.

Clean Slate candidate: Tyler Omichinski

Experience

• Worked for various businesses such as
  the Northwest Company and The Hub
  International
• Entrepreneurial and business
  consulting experience
• Co-president of U of M Debating Union
  
  Why did you decide to run?
  The seeds were planted when I was just starting running for student groups. [ . . . ] I started seeing how things weren’t done as well as I felt they could be in UMSU. [ . . . ] I just found myself in this really good position to take the skills, experience and capabilities that I had, and take all these ideas I had gotten from people and this general consensus that I found that people believe it can just be done better and it can be more responsive to students.

What do you think the role of UMSU is on the U of M campus?
I think part of it that it should definitely go back to the original mandate of a student union and its purpose to advocate on behalf of and negotiate and represent students and their larger needs and wants and desires. [ . . . ] I think UMSU should [ . . . ] be responding far more to the actual needs and desires of students, talking to the student councils and being more proactive and going out and finding out what do people want, rather than assuming that people are going to come with you with information.

What kind of relationship do you hope to have with university administration?
In relation to the administration, I think the most important thing that the UMSU executive as a whole needs to remember is that this is a relationship that shouldn’t be inherently adversarial. There are definitely overlaps between what the university administration and what UMSU administration is interested in. [ . . . ] But that being said, [ . . . ] there are definitely going to be times where [ … ] I am more than willing to be entirely adamant to argue against the administration and tell them “No you’re wrong.” [ . . . ] I think it needs to be that very good balance and very mature and honest relationship between these two groups.