The Georgetown University Student Association (GUSA) Senate voted to elect Megan Skinner (SFS ’24) vice speaker at its Aug. 22 meeting. 

The position became vacant when former Vice Speaker Joshua Bernard-Pearl (SFS ’25) resigned after being unanimously elected to the position April 16. As the new vice speaker, Skinner will serve until the end of the current Senate session in November, when GUSA will hold speakership elections with a new class of senators.

Bernard-Pearl resigned as vice speaker to participate in a study abroad program, according to the chair of the Senate Ethics and Oversight Committee, John DiPierri (SFS ’25). 

“Josh resigned to go study abroad. So there’s going to be a vacancy that we’re going to be looking to fill,” DiPierri said at the meeting. “We’re looking for people to start filling the rest of the committee.” 

The Senate’s speaker and vice speaker both serve in supervisory and organizational roles: setting the Senate’s agenda, overseeing GUSA’s committees and helping to ensure smooth media relations. At meetings, the speaker — currently Manahal Fazal (SFS ’24) — presides over the Senate and ensures members maintain order, with the vice speaker stepping in if the speaker is absent. 

The Senate internally nominates and confirms its speaker and vice speaker in elections at the start of each GUSA session, occurring in April and November.

Meriam Ahmad (SFS ’26), the chair of the Policy and Advocacy Committee (PAC), nominated Skinner as a candidate for the position, while DiPierri nominated Dylan Davis (CAS ’26) and GUSA Senator Ethan Henshaw (CAS ’26) nominated Saatvik Sunkavalli (SFS ’25).

Sunkavalli and Davis both focused on increasing the role and impact of GUSA in their speeches. Sunkavalli said he would aim to work with the university’s administration to ensure GUSA legislation delivers results for students. 

“My utmost priority is making sure that the initiatives that we pass actually, at the end, will impact and can actually go somewhere in administration,” Sunkavalli said at the meeting. 

Davis, who currently serves as PAC vice chair, noted the difficulty of ensuring that GUSA legislation has real effects on the student body. 

“One thing that I did notice, which I think you guys will be sympathetic towards, is that we will be introducing legislation, and there’s sort of a gap in between seeing that legislation actually come to fruition,” Davis said at the meeting. “I think it’s really, really important that, like Senator Sunkavalli said, that we’re having tangible impacts.”

Skinner said her aims as vice speaker would include using GUSA’s powers and bully pulpit to advocate for students’ mental health, as well as ensuring that the Senate works well together with the GUSA executive board and GUSA President Camber Vincent (SFS ’24). 

“My priorities as vice speaker would be especially ensuring good communication and smooth transition on initiatives between Senate and exec, encouraging legislation that’s well researched, as well as putting forward legislation and more initiatives about the connection between facilities on campus and student mental, emotional well-being.”

Skinner said last year’s GUSA initiative to reduce the price of laundry on campus demonstrated that the Senate can help improve student life while also benefiting student mental health. 

“I think that’s just an important part and a small factor in the connection between mental health and the stability of life on campus, and the state of facilities on campus,” Skinner said.

Skinner defeated Sunkavalli and Davis for the vice speaker position with ten votes out of the nineteen senators in attendance at the meeting. 

Skinner said she was excited for the opportunity to make real change through better connecting the senate and the executive.

“I think there’s a lot more we can do in that realm,” Skinner said at the meeting. “And I’m excited to help people be part of that change in whatever role.”