Sophia Koval
Hi everyone! My name is Sophia Koval and I’m a G5 in molecular biology. I’ve served as Lakeside Committee secretary for the past year, and am excited to now be running for chair. As secretary, I was responsible for recordkeeping and responding to resident questions. In doing so, I became aware of some of the most common issues Lakeside residents face. Below are some of those issues and how I’ve worked to address them!
1. Neighborhood-wide HVAC issues
This year, it became abundantly clear that residents are experiencing long-term, widespread HVAC outages that can last several months. I have personally escalated this issue to the head of housing, inviting him to several meetings to discuss the subject. Over the summer, I created and distributed a resident survey where students could report any long term HVAC or maintenance outages. I then compiled that data into a powerpoint that I presented to our management company ACC, university housing officials, and Dean Lily Secora from the graduate school. I believe that this meeting and presentation made the university take these issues seriously, and money has now been earmarked for neighborhood-wide replacement of old HVAC units. That being said, these replacements will take a long time and be very invasive. I will continue to advocate for residents throughout that process, and will always fight for students to have access to the comfortable living spaces that they pay for.
2. Improving resident access to information
Part of my job as secretary was to monitor the Lakeside email and slack channels. I was sure to answer resident questions quickly or direct them to other helpful people/resources. I wrote up instructions on how to use the Lakeside grill, and am in the process of writing up an unofficial Lakeside handbook to make it easier for residents to access answers to their frequently asked questions!
3. Improved communication and accountability from ACC
Communication between residents, our management company ACC, and university housing has been a persistent challenge. As secretary, I made sure to review past meeting minutes for any unresolved issues and added them to the next meeting’s agenda. During town halls, I pushed administrators as well as I could for more information and timelines. I believe over the course of the year, we did get more transparency on why some issues took so long to resolve. I have also pushed housing to hold ACC accountable for shortcomings, especially during long-term HVAC outages that have left units at unlivable temperatures. I will continue to push for accountability in these situations and will make sure resident voices are heard by the administrators with the power to change our experiences for the better.
I hope you will vote for me to continue this work 🙂