In a twist from years past, a new AAS president was elected for the second semester. Last semester’s President Moe Zeidan ’08E graduated, and following December’s election and run-off, Pan Venkatraman ’09 came out on top. Venkatraman’s term is only for this semester, though he can run again for next year if he so chooses. Staff Writer Ricardo Bilton spoke with Pan Venkatraman about what he hopes to accomplish in his semester at the helm of the AAS:

As president of the AAS, what you think your role is?

[I think my role is] to be a representative. You are elected to be a representative of the student body. My job is to make sure that the student’s voices are heard by the student government and by the administration. Whatever concerns there are, I feel like I’m the representative that takes in all of those thoughts and communicates them, making sure they are expressed.

So you see yourself as a figurehead?

Yes. Being president, you consolidate the role of being a spokesperson. Having the title is important. The president has a certain number of duties. He sits on a number of committees, but he cannot bring up things in the senate meetings. I don’t have a vote anymore. My job is to be a spokesperson.

You were elected at an awkward time. With former president Moe Zeidan ’08E graduating in the middle of the school year, you are to become president for one semester rather than two. What do you hope to get accomplished within that short span of time?

I think that there a lot of things that we could do in a semester.

What are some of the issues that you are looking at?

The thing that is hopefully going to get brought up soon is Valentine. What me and a couple of other senators are working on is a pretty good, modest proposal for extending Val’s hours and creating new meal plans. If we go in little increments to create these small changes in Valentine that students want, we will be on a good path.

Just before we got out of school last semester, the senate approved a lot of money to buy new student vans, which will be really good.

Something that isn’t related to money, and is very important to the student body, is the topic of the new buildings and renovations on campus. I feel like the students’ voices aren’t being heard enough. A lot of people are in the dark about this. The school is at a junction now about where they are going next with the master plan. I think it would be really important that students know what is going on, and that what they want is going to be expressed. Sometimes it seems like the administration and Board of Trustees operate in a vacuum.

One of my fellow senators, Josh Stein ’08, was pushing for this, and this is pertinent to the event that occurred last week here: changes at the Counseling Center. Making sure that the Counseling Center has enough staff to meet the demand of students that need help. Sometimes you get the feeling that they are a little understaffed for the students that want to use that service. There are a lot of students that use the Counseling Center.

How do you think the school perceives the AAS? I get the sense that many students don’t see the AAS as all that present or transparent.

I would agree with that. I’ve been on the senate for two years, and I have definitely gotten the feeling that students think that either the senate doesn’t do anything or isn’t transparent. I think that to some degree [their sentiments are true]. But there are so many good people on the senate that spend a lot of time thinking about student concerns.

There are definitely things that we can do to broadcast ourselves. One concrete example: the budgetary process. We should make sure that students know that they can get money from the student government. The student government has the money for students to use. One thing that I want to do this semester is work on that. I was also hoping to improve the AAS Web site as well.

There are a couple of things we can do: student meetings, tabling outside of Val, sending out e-mails to the whole school. There are a lot of things we can do. I don’t think that we are doing a good job of presenting ourselves.

What about all of the unspent reserve money the AAS has? I recall there being a lot of controversy over what to do with it last year.

At the beginning the 2006-07 school year, Dean Haynes told us that we had all of this money left over and we should starting thinking about using it. Last semester, me and [Senator] Peter Tang ’08 allocated $40,000 out of reserves to pay for new vans. I really want to get more student input on what to do with the rest of the money. There are a lot of things we can do with it. Up until the end of last semester, we hadn’t used any of it.

Is there anything else that you would like the student body to know?

We are here to listen to the students. Whatever ideas the student body has, I want them to know that we are listening to these things and want to do our jobs as student advocates.