Elizabeth Mantush | staff writer

This year the Culture Party, led by Mwango Kasuba, and the Mission Forward Party, led by Mary Paternoster, are running head to head in this year’s Student Government Association’s executive board elections which will be held on Wednesday.

The Duke asked candidates from each party to share their goals for the future of Duquesne.

Culture Party

The stated goal of Kasuba and the Culture Party is to increase transparency between SGA and students.

Kasuba said he also wants to represent students who are often overlooked on Duquesne’s campus like international students, commuters and transfer students.

Elsie Angeles, the candidate for vice president of student life for the Culture Party, said that her perspective as a resident aide in Towers and as a Hispanic student at Duquesne provides her with the experience and understanding to bring people together and help meet this goal.

Kasuba said he agrees with changes the current administration has implemented but wants to improve communication with the student body.

“I think it starts with meeting people where they are, which is on social media, people aren’t always checking their emails,” he said.

Kasuba said he would bring a unique personal perspective and experience as president.

Along with being heavily involved on campus, he has also interned for Concentrix, a Fortune 500 company since 2024.

He said that experience allows him to use his connections to network with people outside of Duquesne.

Sadie Kim, who is running for vice president of communications, said her goal is to give new students the experience she wishes she had as a freshman. She said that because SGA consists of so many different backgrounds, majors and schools it creates a supportive community.
 

“I think our first goal would be to make sure that the SGA goals all together are very straightforward and clear, and that our onboarding of new SGA members is more smooth, and that we retain our current members and help them grow to be better volunteers for our community,” she said.

Other candidates include:

Julius Maurice – Vice President of Academic Affairs

Aziz Yumouh – Vice President of Finance

Gaby Garcia – Vice President of Mission and Community

Mission Forward Party

Paternoster said that she wants to make her party as visible as possible leading up to the election.

“We just want to make it known to the students that we are here for them, and we’re running for them, and we want to be in these positions so that we can do everything we can to make campus better for the students,” she said.

Paternoster said that her party is meant to be open and adaptive to students, and the candidates she is running alongside in the Mission Forward Party are an integral part of achieving that goal.

“They want to see every single person they know live up to their full potential, and they really want to do good,” she said.

Elizabeth Skrinjar, the candidate for vice president of academic affairs, is a first-generation college student. She said when she first came to Duquesne she was unsure what to do in college.

“I think the college dropout rate is a lot higher than it should be, and I think it’s because of a lack of accessibility to resources,” she said.

Skrinjar said that she knows there is a stereotype that college students don’t take their education seriously.

“I want to crush that narrative,” she said.

Skrinjar said she would do this by ensuring resources are accessible to all students, regardless of their major.

Skrinjar said she wants to get as many students in as many different schools as possible to get their perspectives on what needs to change.

“Being transparent with students, being personable and approachable is very important. You don’t want leaders that you don’t want to talk to, that you don’t want to approach with issues that won’t be responsive to you,” she said. “It’s about making Duquesne academically the best place for students to be, and that starts with talking to the students and seeing what they need.”

Austin Hansen, the candidate for vice president of finance, said the party’s overall goal is to stay in line with the university’ s mission.

“[It’s] finding ways to help students, help the biggest group of students, as well as the smallest group of students in the margins, and harmonizing everybody together to become one united community or student body,” he said.

In his role, he said he wants to allow for proper delegation of finances, so that the money affects as many students as possible with both larger and smaller scale events to impact groups that have been overlooked in the past.

Hansen said his two and a half years at Duquesne and involvement in Greek life have kindled his passion for activities he’s involved in.

“I think that Duquesne is a very special place with very special people. And I think everyone deserves to feel as if they are those special people within this special place,” he said.

Other candidates include:

Isabelle Bond – Vice President of Communications

D’Andre Moxey – Vice President of Mission & Community

Christian Witterman – Vice President of Student Life

Students vote on SGA’s Campus Link Page or using the QR codes that will be located around the Student Union. Voting will be open from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m.

For more from the canidates tune into theduquesneduke.org for an SGA debate on Friday from 3-4:30.

Editor’s note: Christian Witterman is the ads manager for The Duke

Elizabeth Mantush can be reached at mantushe@duq.edu