By Vanessa Broadbent (The Cascade/Photo) – Email
Print Edition: February 18, 2015
Thomas Davies
President candidate
Fourth-year accounting and finance major, economics minor
Campus involvement
Current vice-president internal
Involvement with UFV committees (e.g. learning environment design, and student health and safety on campus)
Board member, business administration student association (BASA)
What does the position that you are running for do?
President is responsible ultimately for overseeing everything. The key to the president, in my mind, is they really have to have a pulse and have a finger on every single thing that’s going on, but refrain from getting involved in any one project deeply because then you lose sight of the perspective.
What appeals to you about the position?
I’ve come to the point where I’ve had a great experience within my very specific portfolios and as VP internal. I feel like a bigger perspective is a good fit for me.
How do you address the lack of student engagement on campus?
Over the next year of course, we have the Student Union Building opening up, that’s going to radically change the environment and the feel of this campus. Weeks of Welcome has often gone well, but we’ve let that slip as time goes on because we haven’t kept things going and engaged.
There’s going to be some simple things such as an executive blog or president’s blog.
There’ll be videos explaining the different services, talking about opportunities on campus.
I’m also looking to revitalize the event structure a little bit to really put focus on well-planned, professional-run events that students are going to know about and want to be at.
Do you have any specific projects or bylaws you’re hoping to implement?
On the governing side of things is taking another look at our elections policy to see how we can adjust some things to try and help facilitate more candidates, more engagements, [and] how we can give some flexibility to the chief electoral officer. I’m not promising any big new project, but I’m instead going to guarantee that we will provide excellence in our service areas and there will be improvements in all of the services that we offer.
Is there anything that SUS has done in the past year that you have not been happy with?
We sometimes have lacked proper information-sharing and transition, and details. That’s something I want to ensure doesn’t continue to happen, that we have the documentation, the process, and the information for people to always improve instead of doing the same thing over and over.
What have you done with SUS that you’re most proud of?
I’m incredibly happy with the continued improvements in our financial management, our financial controls, and our financial transparency and the budgeting process. Our clubs and associations handbook came out this year, [and there were] improvements with the shuttle bus. I am also very happy with something which is traditionally outside what the VP internal would typically do: my involvement with [the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations]. I was elected to the secretary of the board of directors, so one of the executive positions of the organization.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
