Nathan Poon
Nathan Poon does not want to be a laissez-faire leader. His approach to leadership is having a strong team by his side as he elbows his way into important conversations with MacEwan so that students have a presence when decisions concerning student support are being made.
He sat down with us to chat about his platform after just getting back from a model United Nations event in Calgary where he was pulling all-nighters. So when we talked to him, his platform was a bit hard to pin point, but it boils down to four main points: affordability, accessibility, organizational accountability, and support for students.
Two years ago, Nathan Poon ran an unsuccessful campaign for SAMU’s vice-president (academic). Despite losing that year, Poon hasn’t been sitting idle. He’s been elected as a student councillor twice, he’s president of both the United Nations club and the law club, and just ended his term as vice-president (finance) of the debate club in September. On top of his extracurriculars, Poon is a computer science major with a double minor in finance and political science.
After a few years of learning how SC, SAMU, and MacEwan committees operate, Poon understands that SAMU’s advocacy has limitations. For example, he says he doesn’t think that MacEwan would ever realistically budge on lowering tuition, so it would make more sense for SAMU to use their influence elsewhere. Promising the moon to students might get him elected, but he’d prefer to focus on what he thinks he can really change. Whether that be continuing to advocate for the removal of the sports and wellness fee or finding a way to take a stab at other fees. Poon says that once he has a seat at the table, he’ll be able to negotiate some wins for students.
Poon didn’t provide any scalpel solutions to students’ problems — he seems to prefer the shotgun approach, which is more pragmatic according to him. For him, finding gaps in advocacy is a matter of throwing a bunch of ideas at the wall and hoping “some of them stick.” Once those issues are identified, Poon says he would ensure SAMU and EC commit to sustained advocacy efforts — he doesn’t want to let anything that EC says they’ll do fall through the cracks. Keeping the pressure on MacEwan administration is key, especially on issues that the current EC have been working on, like keeping fall reading break.
“We need to make sure that we’re directly implicated within those discussions and making sure that MacEwan is providing the necessary student support,” he says.
Poon clearly values strong institutional consistency and transparency. The way EC is set up right now is a bit too volatile for Poon. He says that the effectiveness of the execs is at the whim of the personalities that enter into office, leaving them stuck in between the graces of MacEwan’s admin and a little bit of luck. Under his leadership, Poon says he would guide EC to be more consistent, both internally and externally. He notes that he’d like to see SAMU play more of a leadership role in the external students alliances which SAMU pays membership fees to, like CAUS and CASA.
On the transparency front, Poon understands that EC answers to SC. He wants to amend the way EC reports and ensure that all his vice-presidents are accountable for their portfolios so as to provide students with more transparent information on what their execs are actually doing.
“We need to be more transparent in the way we’re operating,” he says.
He knows his way around MacEwan and SAMU, and he’s certainly put in the time with student groups, but it’s yet to be seen if it’s enough to make his own luck as an exec.
By Thai Sirikoone
Darcy Hoogers
Toothless. That’s what Darcy Hoogers hears about the Students Association of MacEwan University. As a candidate for SAMU president, he says wants the teeth back.
“The general feeling around MacEwan, around our students, is that we want the students association to be louder,” he says.
As SAMU’s vice-president (academic) this past year, Hoogers saw what some toothy loudness looked like first-hand when SAMU and students protested in favour of keeping the fall reading break — which could have been cut by MacEwan’s general faculties council.
There were posters, a silent protest during the vote, a weeks-long campaign, and a joint-letter with the faculty association, all of which Hoogers helped organize. He says the administration still talks about that October meeting.
If elected, he doesn’t want to limit this kind of action to just academics. He wants SAMU to be loud towards the provincial government — who he says is “not exactly undergraduate university student friendly” — and he wants SAMU to speak up about global conflicts.
“The first step in doing that is recognizing that there is a genocide going on in Palestine right now, and the university has remained for the most part silent.”
Hooger’s stance is different from the current executive committee, which he has been a part of for the last year. Aside from supporting the right to protest and freedom of expression, SAMU has not taken a firm stance on global conflicts.
Hoogers acknowledges that not everyone might feel the same way as him on the issue.
“I have my perspective, but I have to listen to and take others’ perspectives too into account as we create a plan forward,” Hoogers said when asked about working with people who share different views.
Part of his platform is to strengthen ties with the MacEwan Staff Union (who many students who work for MacEwan are a part of) and the Grant MacEwan University Faculty Association, which is currently in labour negotiations.
One of the reasons why reading break was on the chopping block, was in-part due to a grievance the faculty association had about working on Sundays. With less instructional days in fall, and not enough time for exams before winter break, fall break was considered for cutting.
“Labour relations will impact the student experience regardless of what the outcome is,” Hoogers said, adding that he doesn’t want SAMU to be blindsided by future outcomes.
Despite many, like the University of Alberta, and U.S. government agencies changing policies for diversity, equity, and inclusion, Hoogers says he’s still committed to D.E.I., and is worried about pushback against support for marginalized students.
But he also says it’s about time MacEwan gets some Indigenous student representation, and says he’d advocate to help form an independent Indigenous students’ council.
“If MacEwen wants to be committed to reconciliation, it needs to put its money where its mouth is, and actually have the infrastructure provided for Indigenous students to self govern and represent themselves.”
Affordability is an echoing issue during this year’s elections. On that note, Hoogers says he’ll push to axe the technology fee, which he argues has become outdated. Instead he’d ask that the over $3 million sitting in the fund towards an endowment fund.
He says the fund’s original intention was for one-off purchases of technology, but with subscription services dominating the market, it’s turned into more of an operational cost — which Hoogers argues should be covered by the operational budget.
It is the president’s job to be the director and main voice of SAMU and Hoogers, who is a bachelor of communications student, already with an English degree from the University of Alberta, is one of two candidates vying for the role. As president, Hoogers wants that voice to be louder and bolder than before.
By Liam Newbigging
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