Monday, April 3, 2023 I Vol. 119 Iss. 24
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INDEPENDENT STUDENT NEWSPAPER • SERVING THE GW COMMUNITY SINCE 1904
What’s inside Opinions
The editorial board commends plans to institute live-in adviser positions in freshman residence halls. Page 6
Culture
Learn about a new Afrofuturism exhibit at the National Museum of African American History and Culture. Page 7
Explainer: How disqualifications, Student Court cases delayed the SA elections
Sports
Check in on the golf team as they near the end of their season and prepare for the A-10 Championship. Page 8
ERIKA FILTER
Officials, faculty silent on nursing school dean’s abrupt resignation
RORY QUEALY
CAITLIN KITSON
STAFF WRITER
ASSISTANT NEWS EDITOR
Before campaign season could even begin, disputes and disorganization have marred this year’s Student Association elections. Within the last week, the Joint Elections Commission – the group of five students who manage the SA elections, independent of the governing body – have disqualified two presidential candidates, including incumbent SA President Christian Zidouemba, and one senate candidate from the ballot because of invalid petition signatures needed to qualify for the respective races. After the trio of students appealed the decisions with their own complaints in the Student Court, the SA Senate approved a one-week delay to the election to allow the court the time to hear the cases before voting can commence. The candidate fallout came about a month after the SA finished filling the JEC’s five positions, roughly two months later than their bylaws require. The campaign period is now set to begin Monday, leading up to the new election dates of April 13 and April 14. The JEC scheduled its annual debate for candidates to take place Tuesday, and the Student Court will hold two hearings Saturday, including a session for Zidouemba’s case. We’ve laid out a timeline of the SA’s rocky path to the elections. Here’s what has happened:
EÓIGHAN NOONAN
ASSISTANT NEWS EDITOR
SA appoints JEC two months late
The SA Senate confirmed JEC Commissioner Fatima Konte and two other JEC members, freshman Michael Ubis and senior Catalina Desouza, in January. The SA bylaws state the president should appoint the JEC commissioner before the end of the spring semester of the academic year before the SA elections – in this case, May 2022. If the president fails to appoint a commissioner, the senate should confirm one by Oct. 1, according to the bylaws. The JEC scheduled the election for April 5 and April 6 during the commission’s
CONTRIBUTING NEWS EDITOR
LILY SPEREDELOZZI | ASSISTANT PHOTO EDITOR The SA campaign period is now set to begin Monday, leading up to the new election dates of April 13 and 14.
Feb. 17 meeting, later than the March deadline outlined in the SA’s bylaws. The senate amended the bylaws 10 days later to allow the delay.
Candidates register as Zidouemba waffles on reelection bid
Zidouemba told the senate at a meeting in early March that he would not run for reelection. In an apparent change of heart the next day, he posted an Instagram poll asking followers if he should launch a bid for reelection. Junior Edy Koenigs, Zidouemba’s former senior policy adviser, became the first to run for the SA presidency March 8. Her boyfriend and former SA assistant transportation secretary Nathan Orner announced his own campaign within a day of hers. Roughly two weeks later, SA Sen. Rami Hanash Jr., GWSB-U, sprung his presidential campaign into action, and GW Entrepreneurship Club leader Mohamed Redzuan Bin Mohamed Raffe followed two days later. Zidouemba said in an interview the next day that he would run for reelection after students advised him to do so. Residence Hall Association President Arielle Geismar announced her campaign for SA president on the same day. Zidouemba’s Chief of Staff Keanu Rowe officially announced a presidential run that Saturday.
The JEC disqualifies three candidates from ballot
JEC Chief Investigator Tyla Evans recommended March 22 that the JEC disqualify Zidouemba from the election, alleging he violated SA election bylaws by “wrongfully collecting signatures” for himself while purporting to do so for the campaigns of Rowe and Raffe. The JEC disqualified Zidouemba from the SA elections at a March 27 hearing after Raffe and 2022 SA writein presidential candidate Andrew An testified that Zidouemba did not label his petition sheet with his name, and two of his sheets had crossed-out letters in the line for the candidate’s name. Zidouemba has denied the allegations of impersonating other candidates’ campaigns multiple times. Former SA Finance Committee Chair Ian Ching said in written testimony that he took one of Zidouemba’s petition sheets and added Rowe’s name as a “harmless prank.” Zidouemba said “one or two” of his petition sheets were not labeled with his name while collecting signatures. The next morning, the JEC disqualified Raffe from the presidential ballot because 14 students who signed his petition omitted their GWIDs, which the JEC required to verify signatures. After the JEC struck down the 14 signatures, Raffe did not meet the 385-signature requirement to
appear on the ballot.
JEC delays elections as Student Court cases ensue
In a meeting for verified SA candidates March 28, Konte announced the JEC would delay the elections and the campaign period to a “tentative date” after Zidouemba’s and Raffe appealed their disqualifications. The campaign period originally would have begun March 29. The next day, the JEC proposed the election be rescheduled to April 13 and 14 in an advisory opinion. The senate confirmed the dates Friday.
Student Court hears arguments from appealing candidates
Zidouemba and Raffe each appealed their removal from the ballot to the Student Court between Tuesday and Wednesday. Zidouemba’s complaint argues Evans did not prove all three of her charges – that he impersonated Rowe and Raffe – and An’s testimony was not supported by physical evidence. Raffe withdrew his case in the Student Court Friday after settling with the JEC. Raffe and the JEC did not publicize the terms of the settlement. The Student Court scheduled hearings for Zidouemba’s case for Saturday. The fate of their candidacies are yet to be determined as the SA lumbers toward an uncertain election.
Administrators and School of Nursing faculty have remained tightlipped on what prompted former Dean Mei Fu’s premature resignation in February, leaving the future of the school’s leadership hanging in uncertainty. Since late February, 61 faculty members in the nursing school declined to or did not return multiple requests for comment on Fu’s less than twomonth tenure or why she resigned. University spokesperson Julia Metjian declined to comment on why Fu resigned and how her exit will affect the nursing school’s operations, deferring to remarks Provost Chris Bracey made about Fu’s resignation at the Faculty Senate meeting in March in which he said he selected Forrest Maltzman, a professor of political science and GW’s former provost, to assist him in the search for an interim dean. “Faculty are not communicating anything regarding this matter, including me,” one nursing school faculty member said in an email in response to a Hatchet inquiry about Fu’s resignation. The nursing school has remained leaderless for four weeks now with no clear timeline for the selection of an interim or permanent dean. Bracey said at the March senate meeting that Maltzman will oversee the school as Bracey’s “senior adviser” and will help select its next interim dean while officials search for a permanent replacement. Fu, who will continue to act as a tenured professor in the nursing school, did not return two requests for comment. “I am grateful to the dedicated faculty and staff whom I have closely
worked with during my short time as the Dean of SON,” Fu said in a late February email to nursing school community members. When Fu started the job in January, she became the nursing school’s third dean since July 2021, and her resignation continues a period of upheaval in the school’s administration. Pamela Slaven-Lee, the nursing school’s senior associate dean for academic affairs, served a year-and-a-half-long stint as interim dean of the school from July 2021 to December 2022. SlavenLee replaced former dean Pamela Jeffries, who resigned in July 2021 to lead the nursing school at Vanderbilt University after heading GW’s nursing school from 2015 to 2021. Bracey said Maltzman, then the political science department chair, “worked closely” with Jeffries and Jean Johnson, the founding dean of the nursing school, to reestablish the school in 2010 – nearly 80 years after the first GW nursing school shut down due to the Great Depression. University spokesperson Julia Metjian declined to say how Maltzman will oversee the school during the search for an interim dean and whether officials plan to appoint an interim dean from within the school. She also declined to share officials’ timeline for finding an interim or permanent dean. Four universities have employed Fu in the last four years. She worked as a professor at New York University’s Rory Meyers College of Nursing from 2003 to 2019 and then as a professor at Boston College’s William F. Connell School of Nursing from 2019 to 2021. She then relocated to Rutgers University School of Nursing to serve as a senior associate dean for research in 2021 until she joined GW in January 2023 to assume her shortest-lived role to date as the dean of the School of Nursing.
Bhangra Blowout showcases dazzling performances from teams around the country NATALIE ARBATMAN STAFF WRITER
Mesmerizing an audience of hundreds with every energetic step, eight collegiate bhangra teams from around the country gathered in Lisner Auditorium Saturday night to compete and perform at this year’s Bhangra Blowout before hundreds of spectators. Collegiate teams at the competition perform a selfchoreographed bhangra routine, a traditional folk dance originating in the Punjab region in Pakistan and India, complete with vigorous kicks, leaps and bends of the body and colorful traditional Indian attire. Mallika Saksena, the co-director of Bhangra Blowout, said the GW South Asian Society hosted the first Blowout in 1993, and it has since grown into one of the largest intercollegiate South Asian dance competitions in North America. Saksena said the organizers sold nearly 1,200 tickets, ranging from $20 to $30, for the performance. Competing teams from the universities of Virginia, Maryland and Michigan, Purdue, Cornell and Carnegie Mellon universities and the Georgia Institute of Technology and Virginia Tech performed to an eager and invigorated audience of students, parents and alumni. She said GW alum Gau-
FLORENCE SHEN | STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER Teams from the universities of Virginia, Maryland and Michigan, Purdue, Cornell and Carnegie Mellon universities, Georgia Institute of Technology and Virginia Tech competed in Lisner Auditorium Saturday.
tam Gulati founded the Blowout to bring bhangra from Punjab, India to the United States and allow dancers to pass the tradition down from generation to generation. Saksensa said bhangra connects her to ageold traditions surrounding the dance and its practice in South Asian history that she feels bring her closer to her heritage. “Being a child of immigrants – and I know that a lot of people who were at the competition yesterday are also – we want to be able to
keep our parents’ tradition and our family’s traditions close to our heart so that we can pass that down as well,” Saksena said. Virginia Tech placed first, the University of Maryland placed second and the University of Michigan placed third. Virginia Tech’s performance followed a classroom theme and was set in front of a whiteboard that read “Bhangra 101.” Saksena said to give back to the community, Blowout donated all ticket proceeds to Saahas For Cause, a non-
profit organization that aims to provide mental health resources and education to South Asian immigrants. After the competitive teams performed, three exhibition teams took the stage, followed by the Blowout’s headliner, Fateh Singh, known by his stage name Fateh DOE. Singh is a Toronto-based Canadian rapper, singer and songwriter of Indian descent, known for original songs that fuse modern hip-hop and traditional Punjabi music. He was also a bhangra dancer in col-
lege, and Saksensa said the Blowout organizing team was excited to bring the artist to the South Asian community in D.C. Ria Gupta, the president of GW Naach, the University’s Bollywood fusion dance team which performed as an exhibition team after the competition, said she feels honored to be a part of such a
loud and proud South Asian community on campus. “To just be able to sit in the audience with teams from other schools and to see so many people show up from all different parts of America to be able to perform at our college and to be able to watch us perform was a surreal experience,” Gupta said.