Student Government Candidates Screening

On Monday I had the pleasure of joining the rest of the faculty for the process of screening nominees for various positions in the Student Government.  The available positions that compose the Student Government include: Head Prefect (basically the student body President), Vice Prefect, Dining Hall Prefect, Social Prefect, Discipline Prefect, Academic Prefect, IPP (Information, Press, Publicity) Prefect, Cleanliness Prefect, Defense and Security Prefect, Self Reliance Prefect, and respective housing Village Captains.  While ultimately it will be the student body that will elect their new Student Government leaders, this was an opportunity for the faculty to gage the preparedness of the nominees for their potential position of leadership.  The process consisted of the entire faculty gathering together in the library in the morning and position-by-position the faculty questioned each potential nominee (Q & A in English) about why they want to run for this particular position in the student government, and why they feel that they are the best candidate for the job.  For 10 minutes, each student was asked about their background, their leadership qualities (or lack thereof), their academic records and also what they may do to improve Mzumbe in their respective position, if elected.  Following the questioning, the faculty briefly discussed each candidate and graded them based on their presentations.  Some of the students were clearly more prepared and ready for leadership than others, but all were brave enough to face the candid questioning of the faculty.  After almost 9 hours and interviewing each individual candidate, the meeting adjourned.  The next step will be that the best two candidates for each position will be chosen by the faculty, and then those students will campaign in front of the student body, hoping to be elected by their peers.

It was an interesting experience in many ways, namely because I got to learn more about the students themselves (more than a few are in my particular class), more about Mzumbe and the way that the community functions, and also more about the issues that concern the student body from the point of view of the students.  There were a few occasions when I realized that there are a number of needs (clubs, activities, English practice) that I could help service in the coming year.  It was an experience I was thrilled to be a part of, and from it I felt drawn even closer into the Mzumbe community.