By Jasmine Heyward, news staff

Northeastern’s Student Government Association (SGA) chose next year’s cabinet—through both elections and appointments—and passed two pieces of legislation on Monday.

Along with the recently elected student body president and executive vice president, cabinet members will serve as SGA’s executive board, overseeing how SGA represents the student body and executes projects.

The Senate elected chairs for two of their boards and four of their committees: The finance board, the student involvement board, the academic affairs committee, the student affairs committee, the student services committee and the elections committee. President-elect Suchira Sharma and Executive Vice President-elect Paulina Ruiz also nominated their chief of staff, executive director of communications and parliamentarian, who were all confirmed.

“We have our team together,” said Sharma, a junior business administration major. “It’s so incredible to see the beginnings of a team collect together because the potential is unlimited.”

The following SGA senators were elected and confirmed:

Elected:

• Comptroller — James Baek, sophomore business administration major
• Vice president of student involvement — Brian Hamp, third-year bioengineering major
• Vice president of academic affairs — Joshua Driesman, third-year computer and information science major
• Vice president of student affairs — Nathan Hostert, freshman political science major
• Vice president of student services — Sahil Kadakia, sophomore business administration major
• Elections chair — Kathleen Ballard, freshman pharmacy major

Confirmed:

• Chief of staff — Gabriel Morris, freshman politics, philosophy and economics major
• Executive director of communications — Collin Walter, sophomore biochemistry major
• Parliamentarian — Nina Kalantar, sophomore international affairs and political science combined major

The first piece of legislation passed was the permanent creation of a diversity and inclusion subcommittee under the student affairs branch. This committee will have its own chair, and will initially conduct a survey of students’ attitudes toward diversity and inclusion on campus.

This follows the creation of a similar committee in the fall of 2015 that was discontinued, and served primarily an internal role.

“Sophie [Kurz-Cosgrove, co-author of the legislation] and I saw a need to establish something with a little more backbone,” said Gabriel Morris, a freshman politics, philosophy and economics major and co-author of the legislation. “We also wanted to establish something that was more permanent and was more accountable to the student body and to SGA.”

The committee will begin meeting in the fall, and students are welcome to attend, even if they are not otherwise involved in SGA.

The second piece of legislation was a “sense of the senate” resolution—a piece of legislation that makes an official statement on behalf of SGA and the student body—thanking the facilities department for their hard work over the winter. The Senate unanimously voted to approve the legislation.

“The Northeastern University Student Government Association extends its thanks on the behalf of all undergraduate students to the employees of the Facilities Division for their tireless work toward making Northeastern an excellent place to learn, work and live,” the legislation reads.

SGA’s boards primarily interact with student groups recognized by the Center of Student Involvement. The finance board allocates funds from the Student Activity Fee while the student involvement board approves new student organizations and monitors changes to organizational constitutions.

The elections committee and communications and events committee oversee how SGA interacts with the student body through the spring direct election and SGA outreach, respectively. Meanwhile, the student affairs, student services and academic affairs committees execute projects related to student life at Northeastern.

With the new leadership in place, SGA is looking forward to a productive summer to start their work for next year.

“Both Paulina [Ruiz] and I will be here the entire summer,” Sharma said. “The first thing I want to do is set aside availability [and] understand when everyone is on campus.”