{"676041":{"#nid":"676041","#data":{"type":"news","title":"Grad SGA Leadership Outlines Vision for the Upcoming Year","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EIn Spring 2024, the Graduate Student Government Association (Grad SGA) welcomed new leadership with Kiera Tran as president and Donglai Yang as executive vice president. As they step into their new roles, they have set their sights on addressing key issues affecting graduate students, including housing, career development, resource accessibility, and support for international students.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Ch2\u003EAdapting to a Growing Graduate Student Population\u003C\/h2\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWith the new enrollment [growth], we stand to have more students than ever. With this, graduate students are affected the most,\u201d said Tran. \u201cWe want to tackle this problem by creating a way for Georgia Tech to adapt to the new population of students.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EInternational students are a large part of the graduate student enrollment growth.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cMore than 50% of graduate students are international students,\u201d said Tran. \u201cTo help international students transition to life at Georgia Tech, we talked about creating a buddy program for students to make friends and learn from peers and senior students.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Ch2\u003EEngaging the Graduate Student Community\u003C\/h2\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWe are just two people, and with the cabinet, we have around 20 students to represent the entire student body of over 30,000 students,\u201d said Tran.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EEngaging with such a large and diverse student body presents a communication challenge.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cI think particularly for graduate students, there\u2019s always the challenge of how to reach out to them\u2013how to make sure that what we\u2019re doing here is being seen and heard by the graduate students,\u201d said Yang. \u0022It is a very difficult challenge because it requires that we set up communications not only to the entire campus staff, but also at the department and graduate program coordinators level.\u0022\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ETo obtain the voice of the student population, Grad SGA plans to continue sending out surveys when they want student feedback. They are also going to schedule a town hall for students to attend, which will happen at the end of every semester.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Ch2\u003EStrengthening Relationships with Administration\u003C\/h2\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThe population of graduate students is more than undergrad,\u201d said Tran. \u201cGrad students tend to get neglected because we are not as involved on campus. This is a two-way street. Our goal is to encourage more graduate student involvement in campus activities, while also working with the admins and Institute to prioritize grad student needs.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAccording to Tran, last year they worked on establishing connections with admins, from Pres. Cabrera\u2019s cabinet to admins across campus within each department.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cAll of the admins at Georgia Tech are very supportive of grad students,\u201d said Tran. \u201cIt\u2019s very clear to them that we have different needs, so they want to help us. It\u2019s going to be a very fun year working with all the admins.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cem\u003EGrad SGA is currently looking for senate candidates. Applications are open through August 26. Online and in-person students can \u003C\/em\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/gatech.co1.qualtrics.com\/jfe\/form\/SV_exqNkTgBCnudvue\u0022\u003E\u003Cem\u003Eaccess the application here\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cem\u003E.\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cem\u003EKiera Tran is a Ph.D. student studying geophysical glaciology in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. She began her journey at Georgia Tech in her junior year of college. It was at Tech where Tran discovered her passion for earth sciences and the desire to make an impact on global issues. She has been involved in Grad SGA for the past two years.\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cem\u003EDonglai Yang is a 2nd year Ph.D. student in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences studying the consequences of climate change to the polar regions with radar observations, high-performance computing, and artificial intelligence. This is Yang\u2019s first year serving in Grad SGA.\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cbr\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":"","format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EAs new Graduate Student Government Association leaders step into their new roles, they set their sights on addressing key issues affecting graduate students.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"As new Graduate Student Government Association leaders step into their new roles, they set their sights on addressing key issues affecting graduate students. "}],"uid":"36249","created_gmt":"2024-08-16 14:54:45","changed_gmt":"2024-08-16 15:01:27","author":"Sara Franc","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2024-08-16T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2024-08-16T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"674264":{"id":"674264","type":"image","title":"Donglai Yang and Kiera Tran","body":null,"created":"1719583048","gmt_created":"2024-06-28 13:57:28","changed":"1719583048","gmt_changed":"2024-06-28 13:57:28","alt":"Donglai Yang and Kiera Tran","file":{"fid":"257759","name":"GradSGA_2024.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/2024\/06\/28\/GradSGA_2024.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/2024\/06\/28\/GradSGA_2024.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":137283,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/2024\/06\/28\/GradSGA_2024.jpg?itok=UQGo96Ye"}}},"media_ids":["674264"],"related_links":[{"url":"https:\/\/news.gatech.edu\/news\/2024\/08\/16\/senators-wanted-graduate-student-government","title":"Senators Wanted for Graduate Student Government"},{"url":"https:\/\/gatech.co1.qualtrics.com\/jfe\/form\/SV_exqNkTgBCnudvue","title":"Apply Here"}],"groups":[{"id":"221981","name":"Graduate Studies"}],"categories":[{"id":"129","name":"Institute and Campus"}],"keywords":[{"id":"1808","name":"graduate students"}],"core_research_areas":[],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022mailto:sara.franc@gatech.edu\u0022\u003ESara Franc\u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cbr\u003ECommunications Officer\u003Cbr\u003EOffice of Graduate and Postdoctoral Education\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":[],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}