By Alex Guerra
Jazmin Guajardo is a current freshman at CI and is a pre-nursing student. In addition, she is also the 20-21 Student Government Senator for Student Engagement and is running for the position of Senator in the upcoming academic year.
Guajardo is involved with an organization at CI called League of United Latin American Citizens, with whom she is a president for. She is also on the Vice President for Student Affairs Student Advisory Board and serves on three of its subcommittees: communication, diversity, equity and inclusion. Finally, in her time at CI she has also “advocated for the full funding of CSUs and to improve college mental health services.”
In her current role in Student Government, she has been able to reach out to a lot of different clubs and organizations, and learn about any issues that need to be addressed, in her goal of wanting to promote a more connected student community.
Guajardo explained how she started off interning with Student Government, particularly with the previous Senator of Student Engagement, and how it made her want to apply for the senator position, when the appointment was available. Through this, Guajardo noted that she “learned how to kind of outreach, to write reports, and to see and advocate for any issues that students have brought to (her) attention.”
With regards to her platform, she talked about how it includes wanting to reduce the current fifteen-unit requirement for CI scholarships, to hopefully get it down to twelve. In addition, Guajardo also seeks to advocate on behalf of non-traditional students since, as she detailed, they “are often overlooked” She continued to say that non-traditional students “are unable to apply since they might work more, might have family responsibilities and especially during the pandemic it has been a little more difficult. So that’s something I’ve noticed while advocating for that.”
She went on to discuss how she wants to work alongside Disability Accommodations and Support Services (DASS) to help students feel more accommodated and that their voices are heard and understood; that they can have a say with any issues or opportunities they want to improve or change about the school.
Her final idea is to allow more student engagement to take place, including helping clubs and organization find ways to hold gatherings and events, especially right now with the pandemic raging on, yet with some glimmer of hope that we may one day return to in person gatherings.
“I know the CI Red Cross has some blood drives that they hope to host one day,” Guajardo said on some of the events she hopes to help promote and arrange, paying note that some of them are considered essential events. She goes on to say, “Hopefully that can be something that comes up in the future.”
Furthermore, Guajardo’s desire to help her community plays into how she also wants to help transfer and first-year students, providing them with events and opportunities to really make CI feel like their own. This may also include opportunities to allow students to engage more on campus, such as internships and programs that will offer students mentorship opportunities to allow them to grow and do better.
With so many opportunities and ideas for her platform, she recognized how there is a lot of hope and opportunity to create some events and projects even if it is limited with the pandemic. She said how she hopes “to get some insight into what kind of events can and may have the potential to be held in person, even if it’s limited. And who and how they may be able to do that.”
On a final note, Jazmin provided some final words for students. She noted that “I’m here to ensure that all students receive the most out of their experience here at CI.” Guajardo goes on to notes that regardless if the CI experience will be in person or online, she will always be there to advocate for new opportunities and experiences that can further enrich their CI experience.
