Unfortunately, this past term has marked a low point for Student Assembly. Under the leadership of Tim Andreadis '07, the Assembly has done little to effect real change on campus and to promote broad student interests. His two principal accomplishments have been changing the name of the "Diversity Affairs Committee" to the "Community and Diversity Affairs Committee" and issuing a statement imploring The Dartmouth to have more "journalistic integrity," a far cry from his aggressive campaign pledge to muscle the student newspaper into creating an ombudsmen position. The Assembly's Native American mascot dinner and discussion was largely the result of planning and organizing by the Diversity Affairs vice president. The report issued by the Committee on Standards Task Force had been the outcome of over six months of hard work that began under the previous administration, yet, despite its overwhelming approval by the Assembly, Andreadis worked behind the scenes to undermine the enactment of any change to our outdated disciplinary system.
Instead of working with all segments of campus to think up of new solutions to perennial problems, Andreadis has divided campus along dangerous political lines, further marginalizing the Assembly in the process. His credibility and the credibility of the group in general was diminished after Andreadis sent out an e-mail containing fallacious information on the rape and abduction of two local women. Andreadis' conduct during the hysteria surrounding The Dartmouth Review, targeting individuals personally by name instead of the organizations involved, is equally deplorable.
A massive transformation of Assembly, the likes of which most people originally envisioned Andreadis bringing about, is long overdue. Most students don't care about Assembly, and rightfully so. Many resolutions are passed within the Assembly by wide margins only later to be ignored or dismissed by members of the administration. Unless our student governing body can truly empower students to create change and is run by a leader who is capable of reforming the current structure, the group will continue to languish.
An article yesterday ("Dissatisfied Students May Impeach Andreadis," Jan. 16) quotes Andrew Seal alleging that a personal conflict between myself and Andreadis that took place at the end of last term has motivated me to attempt a general impeachment coup. Further, the article cites information found on Seal's personal blog about the nature of my disciplinary record, which has been used as evidence by Seal to bolster his original claim.
Seal's actions are shameful on all accounts. On his blog, Seal hurls painful insults at me, my friends and my fraternity brothers with careless zeal. In publicizing my personal disciplinary record, Seal disgraces his own integrity and exhibits a reckless disregard for information that was intended to be kept private. Moreover, for Seal to use my disciplinary record as a means of speculating on the rationale behind my actions is shortsighted and unfair. I joined the Assembly over three years ago and have served as an individual representative, an elected representative, a vice-chair and a vice president. Not once over the course of that time span have I devoted my time and energy toward promoting student interests out of personal spite or anger at an individual. To the contrary, my efforts are a reflection of the faith I have in the necessity of advocating on behalf of students to improve the quality of life for everyone here. For Seal to reduce my involvement as a result of a personal conflict I have with Andreadis only serves to make the Assembly look even more meaningless and petty than it actually is. I have worked too hard and long for Seal to make this judgment.
In the coming weeks I, along with several others, will introduce legislation that is meant to change the Assembly and concentrate the power that students have at their disposal. These actions have nothing to do with any personal conflict with Andreadis, and those, like Seal, who advance such nonsense only hurt the prospect of real reform from taking place.
