STORY AND PHOTOS BY JONATHAN FERGUSON
The Sheridan International Student Association elections are beginning this week and plans to open more chapters across the Sheridan community are in the works.
There are eight positions open, with each one having two to three candidates and some with only one entry according to SISA president and international student representative Andrii Sadlak.
“Most of them are already members of the SISA,” said Sadlak. “We want people who are already in the club to become executive members, the ones who have already shown they can perform, and regularly attend meetings and events.”
The positions available include president, vice-president of public relations, vice-president of recruitment, project manager, treasurer, executive assisstant, executive secretary and executive vice-president
The deadline was Tuesday for nominations to be submitted, and voting will be on April 4 starting at 6 p.m. in room A345 at Hazel McCallion Campus.
“There is one day of voting and only people who show up to the election can vote,” said Sadlak. “We will have the results on the exact same day.”
With the positions that have only one candidate, SISA will assess if they are capable of the job.
“Even if there is only one applicant for a position we can see if they are fit for the position,” said Sadlak, “and if not we will try to postpone elections until a suitable person is found.”
Davis Campus and Trafalgar Campus will soon see their own SISA chapters by next term.
“The Trafalgar Campus has a club similar to the SISA and we have scheduled a meeting with their president to speak about combining clubs,” said Sadlak.
“We have members from Davis who attended the HMC meetings and showed the initiative to organized a club at Davis.”
SISA will bring opprutunity for students to learn about different cultures and make new friends.
“The mission of the club is the promotion of cultural differences and the building of strong international family,” said Sadlak. “Students who come to the meeting and events feel much more at home with other international students, playing games, making new friends, learning things about other people’s culture they don’t during class time and how to better live in Canada’s culture.”
As an executive member there are benefits after college as well according to Sadlak, who is on his final year at Sheridan as a Business Management student.
“Executive members learn leadership skills and have something great to talk about during potential job interviews. The SISA is really about helping international students get ready to work in the culturally diverse Canadian environment.” Said Sadlak.
“My favourite part about the SISA is meeting people, people are everything,” said Sadlak. “I think 80 per cent of success in life is about knowing the right people, and people knowing you in a good light.”
Sadlak explains the difficulties that can sometimes come with working in SISA.
“The most difficult part about the SISA is communication. With so many diverse cultures, one thing could mean something different to me than another executive, and when you work together you learn something new about someone’s culture.”
