With the new year comes a new wave of school-wide, student body-wide issues, and four new representatives to tackle them. These are the class representatives who have the responsibility to serve as the voice of their class. So, what urged junior class representative Millie Wong and senior class representative Katie Chen to run? Junior Class Rep - Millie Wong Millie Wong has had a special connection to NYU Shanghai since her freshman and sophomore year, where she served on the student government. Although she is studying away this year, she still remains connected to the school and is very interested in taking her new role in student government to a more professional and intelligent direction. “I had served in Student Government for my first two years at NYU Shanghai and wanted to continue contributing to my community while studying abroad. As members of the executive board, class representatives get to provide a better sense of student body sentiment before voting on SG proposed policy or initiatives,” Wong said. Being close to the class representative her freshman and sophomore year, Wong closely observed the duties and expectations she would need to undertake. When away, she still hopes to strengthen NYU Shanghai in areas it may be lacking. “Two immediate projects that have been raised in the past but never implemented are 1) study-away advice sessions by juniors and seniors to the underclassmen, to tell you guys the things the school/Office of Global Studies doesn't want to tell you about specific study away sites, and 2) a pen-pal/mentorship program to connect the freshmen with juniors before we meet the following year,” Wong explained. She added, “Both initiatives contribute to my overall goal of having the juniors stay involved and relevant as we study away for a year and so that we are not neglected by the NYU Shanghai administration or community!”

Senior Class Rep - Katie Chen

Katie Chen, a Chinese native, is taking on her first student government position. She was encouraged to run for this position for two reasons; she wanted to give back to her community and reflect on what her community has given her. She feels that she has changed a lot over her years at NYU Shanghai and wants to pay homage to the bumps in the road that challenged what she has always known. In particular, Chen would love to help her class keep up with the always changing community. “I think for senior class rep specifically, the most challenging and exciting thing is the commencement. I hope to bring our class together through our commencement events. I hope that we could all bid our farewells with the good memories we had,” Chen said. She explained, “In addition, I hope that through this year’s commencement work, the commencement committee would be able to provide a reference or a guideline for the future graduating class to prepare.” For interviews with the freshman and sophomore class representatives, see here. This article was written by Tyson Lee Upshaw. Please send an email to [email protected] to get in touch. Photo Credit: NYU Shanghai