March 20th is election day at California State University, Bakersfield for a new Associated Student Inc. board. On March 13th, CSUB had a meet and greet with the candidates. Get to know your candidates down below. Don’t forget to check your email for your ballot on March 20th, voting ends March 21st.
Name: Minaya Valentine
Major: Environmental research management
Year in School: Third year
Position they’re running for: President
What inspired you to join ASI?
“What inspired me to join ASI is just to be able to provide a representation for our students.”
Why are you running for President?
“I applied for the position for originally director of special populations because I know that with my leadership skills and my experience that I had with other positions on campus I feel like this is a perfect place for me to advocate for students and also be a voice for our students and meet their concerns.”
What would you bring to ASI if you won?
“I’ve looked into the history of ASI presidents and there has never been a single Black woman that has won ASI President. I want to be able to make history and I want to be able to pave the role for other black women that they can see themselves they see the representation that they can be president of our campus, that they can be someone that has a level of that success but also letting others women that are also on campus that the sky’s the limit the only person that can stop you is yourself and I always believe when they say if not me than who if not now than when.”
Note from the candidate:
“If you want to make history if you want that representation if you want someone who advocates for you and stands for you and stands beside you and having those hard and tough conversations and meet you at your ends meet you should select me as ASI President.”
Name: Erin Pruitt
Major: MBA Graduate Student
Year in School: First-year master student
Position they’re running for: President
What inspired you to join ASI?
“I am currently director of students with disability and the reason why I joined ASI was because I didn’t even know we had a position for students with disabilities and as a woman with a disability myself since I was four and half, I was diagnosed my advocacy kind of started since I was a kid. Throughout high school I went with leaders in life which was like a teen advocacy group as well and so when I came to ASI when I came to CSUB I didn’t realize that ASI had that and I felt like my community was not being represented so I remember I fought for the role and it was right after election season and there was an opening and so I went and it was past elections I had to go before the board which I think is very scary especially when your new I had never heard about ASI and I went before the board interviewed for the position was thankfully accepted.”
Why are you running for President?
“This past year I’ve learned so many different things and I felt like I was able to do a difference on campus and so I reapplied this past year but unfortunately I won’t be able to go again for director of students with disabilities because there’s a two-year term limit which is why I am now applying for president because I want to still continue to make sure that my group feels represented as well as expand that for other groups as well considering I know what it feels to go to a university not even realize there’s a position for your community.”
What would you bring to ASI if you won?
“I think the big thing is that I’ve been able to bring a lot to the table already and I want to continue the good work and so for myself for example there’s a lot of ADA compliance issues on campus and just this year alone I’ve been able to reach out with facilities and there were ADA doors in the BDC building that were being locked so students that had a wheel chair and you need to be able to go to the second floor for your professors office hours you don’t have access to that and I have been able to have meetings with facilities and actually got the signs posted that they are now accessible for students… I also want to increase events on campus so one of the things I’m doing right now is creating the first ever Runner Olympics which is a group for all clubs, organizations, different people to be able to bring back the school spirit… to be in this position I would be able to guarantee that I can increase that outreach and be able to kind of fulfill students requests a lot of students have asked I’ve noticed they want more cultural events on campus and unfortunately there limited to just do one a month and I would view it as well disability awareness is in October but that doesn’t mean I stop having a disability year round so why can’t we have it where its year round So, I want to increase students requests that’s been happening for the past two years since I’ve been on the board and make sure that that’s increased.”
Note from the candidate:
“I’d love for students to talk to me if they have any questions or concerns or if I’m hopefully elected for presidents I want them to be able to come up to me and then say I have this issue on campus or I really want to do this event I think right now there’s a lot of, ASI can be a bit detached from there students and I want to make sure that we bridge that gap I want to make sure that we can go out to clubs see them, get used to it as they don’t come to us we go to them. I want students to feel like they can come and talk to me anyone that knows me knows that I’m always saying hi I’m always bringing snacks and I want to continue that in this role.”
Name: Ibidunni Adebisi
Major: Human Biology
Position they’re running for: Executive Vice President
What inspired you to join ASI?
“I wanted to join ASI because I felt like theirs some parts of campus that are a little bit segregated for one another so I kind of wanted to like bring everyone together to make a huge campus.”
Why are you running for Executive Vice President?
“This position is in charge of the directors and we have our own personal committee called public affairs committee were in charge of that and I would really love to put the word out there for different events and things that the directors might want to put on and be in charge if the directors so it could make us all feel included and make us in charge of everybody and I really hope that by doing that kind of connects with the students and we can figure out like ok what event goes with these students what events will make everyone fell welcomed.”
What would you bring to ASI if you won?
“If I win the election I would bring number one experience cause yes I am experience I have been in ASI before and number two I would bring progression and I feel we would progress a lot with me being the student government leader because I am very professional I have worked in different parts of campus before so I understand students from this area and that area so I’d bring experience progression and inclusion.”
Note from the candidate:
“Voting starts March 20th till March 21st and I hope when everyone gets their ballot on the email they pick me.”
Name: Marcila Diaz
Major: Business
Year in School: Junior year
Position they’re running for: Executive Vice President
What inspired you to join ASI?
“Right now I am ASI director for international students and before I was in this position I was actually attending the ASI meetings just as a president for the clubs that I’m in and when I was in these meetings trying to listen in and advocate for my own club I got interested in trying to do more and advocate for the students all the students on campus and so I decide to join as ASI international director.”
Why are you running for Executive Vice President?
“Through that I made connections with of course our international students I’ve done a lot of advocacy work in talking about our student’s needs, passing resolutions and because of this position and this experience I decided that I wanted to develop more in ASI and applied for the executive vice president position for ASI as well.”
What would you bring to ASI if you won?
“I definitely bring the experience I think it’s really important to understand how ASI as whole organization works and what we actually do and how much it actually impacts the students so for me personally though I definitely bring the organization skills I’m able to dialect tasks I have the time management needed so I understand that in this position this is my priority, it’s important to the students and it’s important to me so I definitely feel that I bring in that new fresh perspective of hey ASI is here for you students you can trust us.”
Note from the candidate:
“I’m very committed and passionate in what I do I think that at the end of the day it’s all about the passion you put behind something when you want a position like this it should be more than wanting the title it should be more of wanting to do more for the students and what kind of effect that has on the campus here at CSUB.”
Name: Antonio Reyes
Major: Music education
Year in School: Junior
Position they’re running for: Vice President of Legislative Affairs
What inspired you to join ASI?
“Well in my work experience I’ve worked with advocacy, before my last position was with the leadership council with leadership and accountability in there I was an advocate for rural communities so I worked with a lot of Spanish speakers and a lot of undocumented folks within Kern County and Tulare County and there we would advocate for good environmental policies cause often those communities are next to things like dairies and big farms that can cause pesticides drift and they just have a lot of health issues and before that I was a homeless advocate where I worked at the open door and my job was helping homeless people find safe and permanent housing. I wanted to take those skills, gains from those two places and bring them here at CSUB and help my fellow students and hopefully advocate for them in the same way.”
Why are you running for Vice President of Legislative Affairs?
“I wanted to take those skills, gains from those two places and bring them here at CSUB and help my fellow students and hopefully advocate for them in the same way.”
What would you bring to ASI if you won?
“I bring experience. Experience not just at CSUB but experience from outside of CSUB I’ve worked with state and local legislators advocating for these communities and this job is exactly that just on campus and advocating for student rights and so what I wanted to do was take those skills and transfer them here and I think those skills are going to be easily transferred.”
Note from the candidate:
“People should get out to vote on March 20th and make sure they vote for the candidates they want, and the only way people can get their voices heard if they vote.”
Name: Kristin Delamar
Major: Biology
Year in School: Junior
Position they’re running for: Vice President of Finance
What inspired you to join ASI?
“I was never really involved in leadership that much in high school and so when I came to CSUB I just kind of wanted to expand more and kind of get out of my comfort show comfort zone and so a position ended up coming open during my first year here and so I ended up applying for that and was inducted on the last half of this semester and then through that I just really found that I enjoyed inside and I was able to see all these opportunities that were offered to me and all these things that we could do for students as well and so I’ve just continued that so since and I’ve really enjoyed my time here.”
Why are you running for Vice President of Finance?
“So in both of my roles that I’ve had previously I’ve been on the Finance Committee and so through that I’ve been able to see how we approve for finance, how we approve for club funding and things like that and I’ve just really enjoyed it and I’ve enjoyed being on the Finance Committee and so I just decided to continue with that path forward and so to have him a bigger leadership role in that and so that’s why I ran for VP Finance.”
What would you bring to ASI if you won?
“As I said I’ve had a lot of experience in the Finance Committee I have dealt a lot with different clubs problems that we’ve run into and different issues and I feel like I’ve been able to get a lot of insight from different clubs as well based on the funding guidelines and things like that and so I just want to take all those ideas into consideration and try to make the process for getting this funding as easy as possible for all the students because clubs are coming back on campus and they’re really important there’s a lot of different like diverse clubs and things like that and so they’re just really important and I just want to make sure that they can do everything that they envision and also ensuring that ASI is functioning properly and that we have the money to give to the students as well and I just really want to do that.”
Note from the candidate:
“Make sure to vote! We really appreciate students voting for ASI elections and wed appreciate your vote. Thank you.”
Name: Victor Guiterrez Hernandez
Major: Communications
Position they’re running for: Director of International Students
What inspired you to join ASI?
“What inspired me was the experience I could get from working with the school council and it’s been very helpful since I’ve joined because it opened my network connection with everyone so I’m very happy.”
Why are you running for Director of International Students?
“I would like to represent all the students from different cultures and backgrounds so they could feel very welcomed at CSUB.”
What would you bring to ASI if you won?
“I would provide more resources to the students, international students so they can have more opportunities here at CSUB.”
Name: Janeth Lazcano
Major: Psychology
Year in School: Senior
Position they’re running for: Director of Diversity and Inclusion.
What inspired you to join ASI?
“I’ve always felt like there was a need for representation for students on campus and I really am just a big advocate for inclusivity diversity, so I felt like it was an opportunity for me to give back to my community so that’s essentially what really drove me to come into this position and really try to make the change here on campus.
Why are you running for Director of Diversity and Inclusion?
So, this position specifically because of the diversity that’s involved in it I really like to embrace all cultures across campus and I feel like they’re isn’t enough of that just yet. So this position really gives me the opportunity to get to know more students on campus and try to implement their culture on campus and make them feel included also, providing a safe space for them to be able to practice whatever you know background they come from and whatever ethnicity they’re from so that’s really why I wanted to do this position.”
What would you bring to ASI if you won?
“If I were to win this election, I think what I would bring to the table is just creating more of a culture of excellence for all students. I am very empathetic and very open minded to all types of cultural backgrounds here on campus so if I’m appointed to this position, I’ll make sure that I fight for their voice to be heard on campus.”
Note from the candidate:
“I would just like to say that you know we definitely all come to CSUB for education but we can also implement more things to make sure that all students on campuses needs are met so we’re not just focusing on just academics but we also want to make sure that they’re included and help them thrive for after when they graduate on campus and just kind of set the tone for when they go into their work settings to make sure that they’re being respected and they’re also being included in work settings.”
