Published 2013-04-24T06:00:00Z”/>
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<strong>The Orion:</strong> What were your goals when you took office? Have they changed during the past year?
<strong>Virdee:</strong> One of my first goals was to strengthen the university relationships. I think in order to be effective within this role and partake in angles you want to achieve you need to have that support and that collaboration with the university.
Next was ensuring that we were being a fiscally responsible corporation. For the past couple years, we’ve seen a decrease in sales for the Wildcat Store, and so how are we promoting a positive change where we can downscale that and remain a consistent and strong business.
The last thing, and I think it’s common between any leader here at Chico State, is how are we promoting the activism, safety and advocacy for our student population.
<strong>The Orion:</strong> What challenges do you think new officers will face?
<strong>Virdee:</strong> One of the largest ones is the future of the Wildcat Store. As I said, there’s been a huge decline in sales over there. So how are we actively promoting the Wildcat Store, because it’s not a bookstore, I think that’s a misconception that students have. We have for the past three years, and we’ll continue to change it because as we all know, the textbook industry is dying.
Another thing you can always go with is higher education, tuition and the budget. That’s always going to be consistently going. That was a huge concern for us this year especially regarding Prop. 30, but we were lucky and for that passing that’s helped us out a lot, but it’s going to be another issue.
Lastly, there’s always some curveballs that come around that no one can expect. It’s just how is that future cabinet going to be on their toes and ready to hit some homeruns with those curveballs.
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<em>President-elect Taylor Herren outlines her goals for</em>
<em>her upcoming office term.</em>
<strong>The Orion:</strong> What are your main goals for the upcoming academic year?
<strong>Herren:</strong> I have two sets of goals. I have some tangible goals as far as the projects and endeavors that I’d like to see supported and propagated, and then I have goals as far as my leadership and the kind of president I’d like to be.
In a tangible sense, I’d like to revamp the freshman education AlcoholEdu that we give our freshmen. At the beginning of the year, I think we need to find other ways to get that out, other than just housing. That is my most current endeavor, just because it’s going to be August soon.
I want to continue the work done this year with the Call to Action and the Commitment to Action. We need to keep progress with bringing them together. I’d like to see a student wellness committee that is focusing on Labor Day, Halloween, Cesar Chavez Day and the programs that are being implemented.
All of our efforts that we’ve done this year as far as bringing the community together need to be compiled and brought together.
<strong>The Orion:</strong> What are you looking forward to as your training period begins next week?
<strong>Herren:</strong> Getting started. I have things that we need to start now.
One of the things that is most important to me and that I can bring to the table is that I have program experience. I worked in CAVE for two years, and I worked on a director team. Any position I’ve ever had, it is not an independent position, it’s a position within a team, and I think there is a lot that can be done to really utilize our officer team. That’s what I’m most excited for, working with the officer team and building relationships with the city and UPD.
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-compiled by Nicholas Carr
