Twelve graduate students were chosen to represent more than 11,000 of their peers Wednesday night when the Graduate and Professional Student Assembly elected its 2008-2009 Executive Board.
The Board will be led by School of Medicine student Andrew Rennekamp. He said he looks forward to continuing the successful work of last year's Board, on which he served as the vice chairman of research students.
"We've accomplished a lot in the Research Council this year," he wrote in an e-mail. "I'm confident that GAPSA as a whole will be equally productive next year."
Rennekamp said he is excited to work with an experienced and diverse board that represents many schools, interests and backgrounds.
GAPSA's major goals include making sure each of the 12 graduate schools have functioning school-specific student governments and ensuring that funds earmarked for graduate student activities are appropriately spent at their discretion, he said.
The group also plans to secure additional funding for the Graduate Student Center's "Navigating" series to help students with dissertations, teaching and grant-writing, the GAPSA travel grant program to assist students in presenting academic work at conferences and the newly created Leadership Retreat.
The group also hopes to boost General Assembly member participation by preparing them to make informed decisions, improve the GAPSA website and introduce online ticketing for GAPSA events.
This year's Board features a new position of vice chair - to be filled by School of Social Policy and Practice student Alejandro Hagan - whose duties include supporting the chair and heading the organization of major GAPSA events.
Outgoing chairman Dan Grabell said GAPSA used to have a deputy position that was eliminated when GAPSA and the Graduate Student Associations Council merged last spring. After a year of experience, the Board realized it would benefit from additional management for large projects and day-to-day operations.
Grabell said some key issues GAPSA will continue to tackle are financial aid, campus safety and graduate student housing.
Rennekamp said leading the Research Council will help him as Chairman because it gave him the opportunity to interact with faculty and administrators while serving as an advocate and facilitator.
He added that his previous experience taught him the importance of shared governance and University-wide collaboration.
"No part of the University works in isolation," he wrote. "As Penn students we exist in enviable positions afforded uncommon opportunities to participate in such governance and to contribute to our own success."
