Led by Ricardo D’Ambrosio, the Yellow Team running for Student Government for the 2020-2021 academic year consists of Omar Sherif as the Segovia Academic Officer, Marie-Therese Burkard as the Segovia Community Development Officer, Cloe Attieh as the Madrid Academics Officer, Mathieu Metral as the Madrid Community Development Officer, and Maria Laura Acosta as the Communications Officer. Their campaign focuses on smaller goals which lead to big changes.
Many of these small goals look to increase the decision power of the Student Government and its student body constituency. For example, they would like to clearly outline the distribution of powers between Student Government and the administration. Along with this reform comes one of their main goals, the IE Parliament, which aims to become the legislative body of the Student Government, made up of elected representatives from degrees and headed by the Debate Club. With the Student Government as the executive, the Parliament as the legislators, and the administration as the judiciary, Team Yellow thinks they can better work to achieve their other goals.
“Our goal is to integrate as many students in the political life of IE and in the decision making the process of our government,” says D’Ambrosio. “implementing a Parliament will create a much greater representation of the Student Body making possible to tackle every concern that they have.”
Team Yellow presents itself as veterans in the Student Government arena, able to get things through from existing relations with administration and past experience. “We say it in a very humble manner” claims D’Ambrosio, “but when it comes to experience, we believe that we are a very experienced team.” Ricardo D’Ambrosio, the presidential candidate, served as the Segovia Community Development Officer during the 2019-2020 academic year, and he believes that experience grants him an advantage in succeeding where other candidates would fail. Additionally, Cloe Attieh, the candidate for Madrid Academics Officer, ran for Student Government in the past year, giving her experience in the processes of the Student Government.
To combat the endemic bureaucracy within the administration, Team Yellow proposes the creation of a strict organizational flowchart to “start making accountable people inside IE’s administration.” They hope that the chart will pinpoint problems within the administration’s decision-making processes, which the Student Government can then report to IE’s higher bodies and hopefully fix. By streamlining processes, they hope to achieve some of their larger goals, such as the IE Parliament.
To address the concerns of Madrid residents disappointed by the lack of community, they propose planning more events to bring students together. Student Government, D’Ambrosio included, has already partnered with the Culture Group, one of the biggest event organizers for IE students. Additionally, Mathieu Metral, the candidate for Madrid Community Development Officer, co-founded Alcazar and Alcatraz, two very popular events within the IE community. These two factors, D’Ambrosio claims, “will help us organize a lot of successful events for our students to increase their involvement with the campus”.
To help mend ties between Segovia and the local community, the Yellow Team proposes that students visit local schools and give talks about IE, increasing the exposure of locals to IE students. Additionally, they wish to reach out to local newspapers to help cover stories surrounding IE. Finally, their main proposal to mend relations features “International Days”, where IE hosts locals in our various Segovia campus locations, as to “have a nice afternoon while getting to know each other.” They hope that this increased exposure will help integrate IE Segovia students into the fabric of the city.
To sum up their campaign, Team Yellow chose the slogan “Here’s to Change!”, highlighting their focus on progress within student government. “First we want to implement the small changes which are creating more decision making power for the SG to help us move a bit and have more freedom when it comes to our competences,” says D’Ambrisio. “When we achieve that, we can implement the big change that everyone is waiting for, such as the barbecue, the Olympic Games, a bigger spring ball, and an even better freshers week.” You can follow the Yellow Team at @ieyellowteam on Instagram.
