As the presidential debates are heating up for the 2016 election, Towson University residence halls held their own elections! Last week, the Glen Complex held elections for building council positions and Kiana Anspach was elected as the vice president of Tower A. “I was a little nervous because I wasn’t sure who else was running, because we don’t know at first,” Kiana said.
In the weeks leading up to the election, those running posted flyers and began spreading the word on social media to the residents of Tower A. Later she found out she was not running against anyone, basically guaranteeing her the position! However, she was on a ticket with three other people who were running for president, secretary, and treasurer, “I was more worried for my ticket because they each were running against other people and I really wanted all of us to win, and we all ended up winning in the end!”
This is not the first time that Kiana has been involved with building council; last year she was a building representative for Tower A and in high school, she was vice president of SGA her junior and senior year. “I knew that the vice president did a lot of advertising and I was like ‘I feel like I would be really good at that’ so I wanted to do that,” she says. Her experience with SGA in high school and with building council last year helped push her to run for vice president, “I’m just really passionate about helping and getting involved.”
As vice president, Kiana knows that other than helping to plan events she will have to advertise for them; “I know that we’re going to have to do a lot of advertisements and with my schedule, I have so many credits that I’m kind of worried that I will have trouble balancing out everything.” She is taking 17 credits this semester and has something due almost every day, but so far has been able to manage her responsibilities well.
Other than advertising, Kiana also attends meetings with Resident Outreach Committee, which strives to increase resident involvement in the community. She also will help with event planning and finding ways to increase the student involvement. There are two big events Kiana and the rest of building council are currently planning and preparing for. “We actually have a big event coming up called Glen Gala. We tried to plan it last year but it didn’t work. It’s kind of like a homecoming. We’ll have superlatives and we’re going to work with other councils in Glen and then another is Field Day. We would try renting out one of the turf fields and have games and stuff.” Kiana feels like Field Day will be a great event because it will attract all students; “A lot of our events last year were catered towards girls and we want to try to get more boys to come to our events.” On campus students have a lot to look forward to this year!
Even though this position will allow Kiana to help other students get involved and find places for them in the community, she also sees the personal benefits this position brings her. “I had a problem sometimes with being shy and not speaking up, but I kind of grew out of that. I think that as vice president, it’s going to push me to talk to others and become more social!” Along with personal growth, this position will help her with her future as a dentist and becoming comfortable interacting with others in her profession.
If you are interested in building council, there is a way to get involved! All residence halls have building council meetings that you can attend. After finding out when the meetings take place, you can go and contribute your ideas and become involved with what happens in your residence hall!