To encourage student involvement at MGCI, SAC created the SAC Goodwill Ambassadors. The council intends for these ambassadors to have a major role in planning SAC events, act as an outreach committee, and be responsible for their own annual initiative. SAC Goodwill Ambassadors will also be the the school’s grade representative candidates.
The SAC Ambassador application was created by both the school’s administration and student council members. They took special care in making sure that questions in the application were easy to understand for ESL students that were interested in applying. SAC opened applications on the 4 November, 2016, and closed it on 18 November, 2016, giving students a full two weeks to complete the application.
A poster for the SAC Ambassador application posted in the MGCI Updates 2016-2017 Facebook group. Photo: Zaid Baig
Through the application, SAC hoped to see an applicant’s passion for the school and a clear interest in SAC. When asked what they were looking for specifically, SAC said that they were keen on seeing future leaders, and students who want to get involved in their community.
SAC hopes that students will use the SAC Goodwill Ambassadors position as a stepping stone, and believes that this position will guide those who hope to hold executive positions in the council. The position is also a great opportunity for those interested in understanding the inner workings of SAC, and the responsibilities of the positions they hope to run for in the future.
Janet Chen, a selected SAC Ambassador in Grade 10 says that she applied because “TOPS students are often secluded from the rest of the student body” and she hopes to “bridge the rift between TOPS kids and the rest of the student body.” Ruknoon Dinder, another selected SAC Ambassador in Grade 12 at Garneau said that he has always been active in student politics, and hopes to unify Garneau.
SAC garnered a total of 40 applications, and accepted 36 of those 40. From the very beginning, they had no set number of accepted applicants in mind, but rather took as many as they believed were qualified. However, the council wanted an equal number of applicants from each grade. All applications were read by a committee of seven from within SAC, and results were sent out on 29 November, 2016. Three of the accepted applicants informed SAC that they wished to withdraw their application. The following are MGCI’s 2016-2017 SAC Ambassadors:
Grade 9: Janet Chen, Fawad Naveed, Lumuat Nusaiba, Naveen Jaishankar, Janani Satkunarajah, Laura Lu, Nelson Lee, Karen Liu, Angela Pang, Dora Su
Grade 10: Frank Hong, Eric Wang, Hannah Nie, Naveena Ragunathan, Biethel Keflu, Helen Chen, Saima Zafar, Janet Cheng, Aisha Azam
Grade 11: Nibras Khan, Raluca Gondor, Subaani Mathyvathanasingam, John Le, Jennifer Dong, Jennifer Huang, Areeba Asghar
Grade 12: Maheen Razi, Javaria Sana, Ruknoon Dinder, Wadood Hasan Syed, Daniyal Syed, Monami Sina, Zain Rashid
“This project has been developing over the past 3 years but it was finally this year’s SAC who put it into action,” commented SAC Vice President Khalida Elsadati. “This new system will expand the outreach of Student Council and introduce a more democratic system for electing Grade Representatives. I’m looking forward to a successful year and working with the new SAC Goodwill Ambassadors, and their many initiatives.”
SAC plans to release the elected Semester Representatives by 15 December, 2016.
