Get to know the candidates: DIVERSITY VP
EDUARDO NUNEZ-HUERTA
Eduardo Nunez-Huerta, a candidate for ASUSU Diversity vice president, said he will try to change diversity from not just a cultural issue, but also a social one.
* Why should students care about ASUSU?
“ASUSU represents students in the school and students to the community,” Nunez-Huerta said.
He said he understands the need for students to express themselves, so that will help him know better what to represent to others.
* What research have you done for your platform?
Nunez-Huerta said because of his study abroad to Puerto Rico and moving from Mexico, he understands diversity well.
“Students at USU that come from another place [culturally], have to adapt to a new environment,” he said. “I’ve had to do that.”
* How do your platform and qualifications relate to the position you are running for?
Nunez-Huerta said because he’s been in the Hispanic Student Union and other student organizations, he knows how to work with clubs. As the vice president, he would mainly be coordinating with clubs to increase diversity awareness, he said.
* How will you increase interaction among clubs and organizations?
Nunez-Huerta said he would like to assemble a diversity council for which every club and organization would send two representatives.
“The council would help provide information to other students in other clubs,” he said.
He said he’d like to set up a Web site for students to post ideas and concerns. This would be especially useful, he said, to culturally diverse students who might have different concerns than the average USU student.
* Why is social diversity just as important as cultural diversity?
Diversity is new in ASUSU, Nunez-Huerta said, so the attention is still mainly on the cultural instead of the social.
“Hispanic women have the highest rate of breast cancer,” he said, saying that making information like this known would help promote different kinds of diversity. (Editor’s note: According to the most recent statistics found on Web sites for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the American Cancer Society and the Surgeon General, there were 7.7 cases of breast cancer detected per 1,000 white women and 4.9 cases per 1,000 Hispanic women in 2000.)
“When people see a disabled student, they look away,” Nunez-Huerta said. “This is very much a social issue. Disabled people are just as diverse as someone of a different race.”
–emilieholmes@cc.usu.edu
ANGIE HAMMOND
Angie Hammond is running to try and change the way diversity is viewed by the student body.
* Why should students care about ASUSU?
“ASUSU is for the benefit of the students,” she said. “Everything they do is for the students.”
Hammond said ASUSU might be the only thing that students have to benefit them, so they need to care about it.
She said she’s going to try to change what diversity means to ASUSU, in turn changing the influence ASUSU has on the student body concerning diversity.
* What research have you done for your platform?
“I’ve worked on the committee all year, so I know what works and what doesn’t,” Hammond said. “I have a better outlook on some issues.”
She also said she’s half Polynesian and loves going to multicultural activities, but her traditional American roommates don’t want to join her. This has helped Hammond get ideas on how to approach others and incorporate them into multicultural activities, she said.
* How do your platform and qualifications relate to the position you are running for?
Hammond said she’s worked with the Diversity Committee and its affiliates all year long.
* Why is it so important to change the stigma of diversity?
Hammond said it’s important for every student to be more accepting and educated about diversity.
“A lot of non-diverse or white people, are uncomfortable coming to a multicultural or diverse activity,” she said.
Because of this, Hammond said, people need to realize everyone is diverse no matter race or color.
* How will you get more students involved in activities?
“I’m going to do advertising to all groups of people,” Hammond said.
She said she would try to make the advertisements for multicultural and diverse activities more appealing to the general student body and have a “friends bring friends” goal.
Hammond said she would focus on working with all of the groups she can. She would also continue working on the Diversity Carnival, which drew a lot of the community in this year, she said.
–emilieholmes@cc.usu.edu