USAC transfer representative petition seeking signatures

Nearly 1,000 students have signed a petition to create a transfer student
representative seat within the undergraduate student government, but the measure is still far from the number of signatures it needs to have to be voted on by students during spring elections.

To gather more signatures for the petition, transfer student advocates are holding an event outside the Bruin Resource Center on Monday afternoon. Students will be offered free pizza and Diddy Riese cookies at the event.

For a constitutional amendment to get on the ballot as a referendum in the spring Undergraduate Students Association Council elections, the petition needs to collect signatures from 15 percent of the undergraduate student population, according to the Associated Students UCLA and Undergraduate Students Association Constitution.

This means that about 3,200 more students would have to sign the petition for it to make the spring elections ballot. For the proposal to pass as a constitutional amendment, two-thirds of voting students must vote in favor of a referendum.

The signatures need to be collected 15 days before the elections, which are set to take place during sixth week.

Some transfer student advocates started campaigning for the new USAC position late last quarter, said Nicole Fossier, a USAC Internal Vice President’s office student group liaison who helped create the petition.

“We want to make sure that someone is bringing transfer issues to the table,” Fossier said.

Transfer student advocates’ efforts to promote the measure included reaching out to students online to educate them about the petition, said Alyssa Nunez, a third-year political science transfer student and an advocate of the petition.

Transfer students make up one-third of the undergraduate population of the campus, according to statistics from the UCLA registrar and admissions website.

Some students said they think the creation of a transfer-specific position would raise questions about the need for representative positions for other student demographics.

“Transfer students are a huge voting block. If a position is created for them, then why not one for Latinos or black students?” said John Tsiang, a fourth-year political science student and external chairperson for the UCLA Community Programs Office.

Dale Ford, a fourth-year English student and chairman of the Transfer Student Alliance, said he thinks that the USAC Cultural Affairs Commission is an outlet that already exists to address the issues of some student demographics, but the commission is too small to effectively address transfer issues.

He added that he thinks a transfer student commission would more effectively serve the needs of the transfer student population.

“Having a transfer representative will make transfers feel more welcomed and like they have a voice at UCLA,” Ford said.

Voting for the elections is set to begin May 6.