Advocate
The Independent Student Voice of Mt. Hood Community College
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www.advocate-online.net May 2, 2014
Volume 49 Issue 26
Which candidates will make their mark? Recap: candidates debate their platforms by Greg Leonov The Advocate The ASG presidential and vice-presidential candidates for 2014-15 spoke during debates held on campus Monday and Tuesday about assisting students with textbook affordability, better engaging the surrounding community with Mt. Hood Community College, and raising student and community awareness about campus events. Alma Pacheco, who is running with vice-presidential candidate Cristian Urzua, wants to bring the Textbook Tradeoff to the MHCC campus. “Just like the Barney’s Pantry, we should have a place organized so people could go there and trade their book, and do it personally — not through the (online MHCC) portal, because we do hear a lot that the portal is really hard to access,” said Pacheco. Urzua called the team’s proposed idea “Barney’s bookshelf,” and said it would be located in the Student Union. Under this plan, students would “bring in their math book and ask if we have a business book, and trade it off,” he said. “It’s gonna be easy, accessible, and that’s what our students need,” Urzua said. Currently, Mt. Hood has a tradeoff program, which is accessible on the portal, he said, but “many of our students hate the portal. Why do you put something so great on the portal?” Kristin Werner and Diana Ramirez, running as a separate ticket, want to advertise the existing tradeoff program better than the current methods do. “We need to make sure that our students are well informed of what’s out there and make sure they’re utilizing the available resources for them,” said Werner, running for ASG president. Ramirez said she agrees that textbook affordability is “definitely one of the biggest challenges that we’re all facing today. Last year, I went to (Washington) D.C. and lobbied our national legislators and I had them talking about how textbook affordability is affecting me and many of our students
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here,” she said. She plans to do the same next year, she said. Jonathan Beaman and Nathan Doering, the third ticket in next week’s election, have a long-term idea to pursue, if elected: They plan to buy the bookstore. But, Beaman, the presidential candidate, mentioned a short-term plan, as well. “I would love to maybe have a table right here (in the Main Mall) with a catalog with the books that we have that are available to trade,” he said. As for a student-owned campus bookstore, “I would love to have (a) student presence in there to say ‘Hey, it’s not fair to the students, and the students are why you are here, you need to answer to them,’ ” he said. All of the candidates had something to say about spreading greater awareness of Mt. Hood’s presence to the surrounding community. Pacheco said she wants to let the community know about existing programs the college offers. “Programs already have internships available for their students – like mental health, like education, like our funeral service, automotive, they already have those internships available,” Pacheco said. “Education is possible here, students can come here and take advantage of the Planetarium, or Cosmetology, our pool, our rock wall, our gallery, our early childhood development center, all of those things are available for the community,” she said. Werner said she would like to “hold more events off campus. Say it’s March Madness, and we could get into Geno’s…. and involve our local community,” she said. She also wants to see open-house style events “where the public here joins us on our campus, and they can see what we stand for, what we’re all about.” Werner wants to go to Gresham Chamber of Commerce meetings to learn what businesses in the Gresham area are saying and to provide feedback from the college.
Candidates
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Editorial Endorsement Read who we think should be MHCC’s next ASG president
Graphic by Heather Golan - The Advocate
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assion, presence and realistic goals: These are among some of the reasons that we at The Advocate are endorsing Alma Pacheco as ASG president. Before we go more in depth about why Pacheco is our choice, let’s address the other candidates.
To see the candidates in action and a summary of their main points, go to www.advocate-online.net
Endorsement
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