Though outgoing Georgetown University Student Association President Juan Martinez (SFS ’20) and Vice President Kenna Chick (SFS ’20) began their term unexpectedly, the circumstances did not prevent them from prioritizing the issues that matter to students most: diversity, student activism and mental health resources.

The pair, who were confirmed to office in October following a series of resignations in September, entered their term with an emphasis on diverse representation and encouraging student advocacy. Martinez, who previously served as transition chair of the senate, became president under GUSA’s bylaws Sept. 16. Martinez nominated Chick on Oct. 1, and the GUSA senate confirmed her nomination Oct. 2.

The week they exit office, Martinez and Chick reflect on their term as GUSA executives, including the obstacles they faced restoring stability to student government and the highlights of their term.

What are you most proud of from your term, as a collective administration and as individuals?

Martinez: I think Kenna and I did a good job on starting a conversation on the importance of valuing student activism within GUSA. It was a really big part of the executive elections this year, which is something that ever since I came into GUSA as a freshman senator, I was very passionate about.

Chick: When we came into office, for us the really main thing we wanted to focus on was just stabilizing the situation, as you all know. I think that for us, part of it was definitely just making sure that the situation is something that we needed to take care of, but also moving forward from that and doing the work that we wanted to do within policy, and I think that given we did not have a full term to really work on the things that we did, we still made changes in places that we felt like were very important to make changes in, particularly within policy.

What challenges did you face coming into your term in the middle of the fall semester?

Martinez: Following all the events in September, we couldn’t expect huge turnout and interest in people wanting to join our organization, but we did pull through and we managed to get a good cabinet in place where our senior staff, the first group we managed get in the executive, was extremely diverse with a majority of people indicating different non-white races. It consisted mostly of women, not men. That was one of the first things where we said, you know, maybe we didn’t get a full term in and maybe we didn’t get all the fallout, but we still are drawing from these communities that are underrepresented and we had a lot of students who had never indicated interest in GUSA apply to our cabinet, students activists who wanted to join.

Chick: The transition had been very difficult just because of the timing of things. Neither of us had really planned to devote this amount of time to GUSA, and for us, once we counted, I think it was around 20 hours a week, just for planning and meetings. In addition, when there were different emergencies that we had to deal with or things that came up last minute that we had to work on, there’s just added time to that. For us, that was not something that we expected and I would say I think that we both managed to change our schedules around to ensure that whatever time was needed was put into GUSA, and made it our priority.

Given the nature of the last executive’s resignation, how have you worked to restore trust and stability in GUSA during your term?

Martinez: I think one thing we have done is we’ve tried to be more transparent by putting out many more press releases than in the past. That’s a direct way of getting the messages out to people, telling them here’s what we stand for, here’s what we support. When students in our community are hurting, how we’re going to show up for you.

Chick: I think that GUSA definitely has the resources to do a lot of the work, but also that working with student activists is very very important in getting things done, definitely to ensure that we’re all working on things together, because I think that at the end of the day we all care about things on this campus and we all want to see changes, and it is definitely more helpful to work together with people that are involved and really understand what are the different sides to this, rather than working against each other. I think that that’s definitely something that we’ve made a point of doing in order to bring stability really to our administration, is to really start working on things with the people that it involves.

What do you see as your legacy? What do you hope students took away from your leadership this year?

Martinez: I think that in terms of our legacy, I hope people felt comfortable with us in office at the top. I think that us taking over was a huge change from the last administration, and I hope that people recognize that. We did our best to represent students in the face of sort of any major concern that hit campus, making sure we stood with students.

Martinez: I think it’s very very powerful the way that Kenna and I were able to change the conversation, or kind of shape the conversation for the future. But also, I hope that the projects that the projects we were able to accomplish during our three or four months provide some sort of help to anyone in the Georgetown community. As long as that’s true I think that I will think we left a good legacy on campus.

What is the biggest challenge incoming GUSA President Norman Francis Jr. (COL ’20) and Vice President Aleida Olvera (COL ’20) face entering office and the biggest thing they have working in their favor?

Martinez: I think that in response to lack of confidence in GUSA, and that’s something that a lot of admins have faced before, but I think especially in light of recent events in September, addressing that and making that a big part of how they’re going to respond to these concerns. You have concerns that come up from the conference in GUSA, but you also have this new conversation that’s starting with how to best incorporate students. I know they did a really good job of addressing those concerns specifically, making them a big component of their debates and their campaign, but I think manifesting that into action.

Chick: We’re very happy to provide any advice or insights or let them know what happened at certain meetings so that when it’s their turn to pick up that mantle and start advocating for some of these issues, they can do so with the full knowledge of what had happened in the past. So that way they have in their favor people who have been working on these issues for a really long time and that is so important for advocacy. Given the way that transition looked for us, I think that I’ve put it as a priority to help them through their transition as well.

What strengths do you think each of you have that played well off of one another this semester?
Martinez: Where we complement each other specifically is that I used to be in the senate beforehand and Kenna used to be in the executive, so Kenna knew a lot about administrators and specific areas, but also the way administrators would respond to certain things, saying, ‘They’re gonna say this. Here’s how they responded to me before. They tell you to contact 10 people, which is just a tactic to slow you down.’ Stuff like that I found really useful, just like institutional knowledge, knowledge of who the admin was and how they think.