Madeline Goodwin and Cayla Chew: Leaders of the 2024-2025 Student Union

In the wake of an intense election season, the Student Union (SU) welcomed its new president and vice president for the 2024-2025 year—junior Madeline Goodwin and sophomore Cayla Chew, respectively. Goodwin is the current Chief of Staff of the SU, and Chew is the current Sophomore Caucus co-president. Chew previously served as the Freshman Caucus co-president during the 2022-2023 school year.

Both Goodwin and Chew have a shared passion for student government and a strong appreciation for each other’s strengths. Chew speaks fondly of her partner, highlighting Goodwin’s work ethic as a defining trait. “I think she’s so hardworking. One day, I was up at 3:00 a.m., and I shared a document with her, and she responded right away. She was also working around the clock,” Chew said. 

Goodwin reciprocated this sentiment, praising Chew’s diligence and her skills when working with others. “She genuinely has worked so hard since the beginning, which, ever since I’ve known her, she's just been continuing to be such a hardworking, kind caring person. I think that's why we work so well together because [...] I feel like we’re able to balance workload and collaborate,” Goodwin said.

Looking ahead, Goodwin and Chew have outlined several key policies and initiatives that they plan to implement as president and vice president. Chew emphasized the importance of creating fun events to promote school spirit. “I think a lot of our policies [were] to create fun events for students, to show you can have a good social life while balancing schoolwork and still having good grades,” Chew said. 

Goodwin identified supporting the Clubs & Pubs Department as a priority in their campaign, acknowledging the challenges that they face such as the lack of student engagement and the shortage of available rooms. “I think a lot of clubs had trouble gaining new members and having regular meetings, for a couple of different reasons, but I think that's a big thing that we would try to target next year,” Goodwin said. “Trying to figure out a way that we can secure more club rooms, working with the administration on that, because that is a difficult process, but working on that, or finding some other way to promote club activity is huge.”

When asked about potential changes to SU policies and structure, Goodwin-Chew expressed a desire to maintain transparency within the student body. “I also think that doing something like a Cabinet meeting summary, or having more communication on things like the weekly email or on social media [would be important],” Goodwin said.

In addition to increasing transparency throughout the student body, the pair aims to connect students to and better inform students of SU resources, such as club funding. “I think [we need to bring] more awareness to certain things, such as budget allocations. A lot of clubs are just not aware of the fact that they can get funding from somewhere else,” Chew said.

Although Chew and Goodwin aim to make beneficial changes to the SU in the best interest of the student body, they don’t plan on taking any drastic measures and straying from its traditionality. “I think that a lot of the policies that we have right now are pretty solid. I feel like in the past few years, the SU worked pretty hard to have a strong set of policies and events. I think a big part of it would be [...] continuing the work that has been done in the past few years,” Goodwin said.