BreakThru TU plans to promote TSG events to keep the student body involved and informed.
“Relieved” appears to be an understatement as members of BreakThru TU, next year’s executive office ticket for Temple Student Government, described their post-election feelings.
“I can sleep again,” Natalie Ramos-Castillo, the student body president-elect, said. “We’ve been working on this since December, so it’s like really seeing all of our hard work actually pay off.”
The 1,345 votes that BreakThru TU garnered made it the winning ticket at the end of elections. BreakThru TU beat competitors Owls United and TU 360.
The ticket noted “being out there,” as its key to success in the elections.
“We were outside for a total of 10 hours a day … talking to students, actually going up to them and finding out something about them and then connecting it to our platform,” Ramos-Castillo said.
“That’s also kind of how we want to bring change to what Temple Student Government should be viewed as next year,” vice president of external affairs-elect Damon Williams said. “We’re going to be out there interacting with all the students, even now, making sure that people understand that their voice can be heard.”
Despite their temporary “stress-free” attitudes, vice president of services-elect Alex Shelow said the ticket’s victory and the days that have since followed are only the beginning of a long road ahead.
“I’m getting all the e-mails from administrators saying, ‘We need to sit down for lunch,’” Ramos-Castillo said. “Now I know how [current TSG President] Kylie [Patterson] feels with all of her e-mails.”
Preparing to officially take office, the members said one of their first priorities is to create a commercial that thanks voters and tells students how to get involved with their platform’s initiatives.
“We’re going to be talking to the other slates … about incorporating some of their initiatives into ours and getting their input on it,” said Ramos-Castillo, listing this as another priority. “People still believe in them, and we don’t want those students to get turned off from TSG.”
When asked about specific ideas the ticket would consider adopting from other tickets, BreakThru TU cited TU360’s idea to make TSG a constituent service office and Owls United’s hopes to better connect commuter and transfer students with the university.
The ticket also mentioned the current executive board’s recently developed offering of free legal-advising sessions that current Vice President of Services Jon DeSantis spearheaded.
The service, available April 23 and 26, is designed to help students by gathering law students and alumni to offer legal advice with things like traffic tickets and landlord problems.
Ramos-Castillo said she, alongside TSG Senate President Colin Salty, is also currently involved with creating a committee inside the Senate to focus on promoting TSG events next year.
TSG currently has two event-promoting positions, one for marketing and one for public relations, but the ticket said teams of students working with them would be more effective.
“We want to make it a team so that more people have more input and more work can be accomplished,” Shelow said.
The ticket members also said they have plans to enter next school year with a calendar of events so that students can keep up with TSG happenings, an idea the current executive board’s platform originally called for.
“If they didn’t know about it [TSG], they’re going to know about it,” Ramos-Castillo said.
“Everyone used to ask me what the difference was between our platform and other platforms. I was like ‘This is literally a list of what we’re going to do,’” Williams said. “BreakThru TU is ready and waiting.”
Angelo Fichera can be reached at afichera@temple.edu.
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