Sophomore Caucus: Olivia Dogan and Salioudian Barry

RECORD: Both Dogan and Barry have had ample experience in leadership and organization at their middle schools and at Stuyvesant. Barry was president of her seventh grade class and is currently one of the SING! directors and a step Co-Director. At her middle school, Dogan was the event coordinator of SO and founded the Red Cross club. At Stuyvesant, Dogan is the only freshman on the Stuyvesant Red Cross Board, and she aided in organizing logistics for the Health Fair this year. Dogan’s experience in event coordination, combined with Barry’s prior student council knowledge and leadership in dance-related clubs, is an especially auspicious consolidation that holds promise for the effective execution of their policies. Though neither Dogan nor Barry have had prior experience in student government at Stuyvesant, their background in other areas of leadership and participation should account for this potential deficiency.

DYNAMIC: Barry and Dogan possess good chemistry. Their personalities are complementary, and they are not afraid to discuss issues and ideas together. During an interview with The Spectator, they were able to bounce off of each other effectively to formulate thoughtful and thorough responses.

PLATFORM: A big objective of the Dogan-Barry ticket is to create policies that are feasible and realistic so that they can uphold the promises that they make. They want to focus on student engagement through talk circles, forums, and social media activity. Their website and social media are adequately developed, though they could use some improvement if they wish to heavily rely on them for student engagement. They also wish to continue previous caucuses’ policies, such as consolidating study guides and holding event nights, because of their established successes. Another goal of theirs is to make resources and information more accessible to the student body through organization days and the creation of useful guides.

The Dogan-Barry ticket is a strong contender for Sophomore Caucus. They both have ample experience in leadership and possess good communication and speaking abilities. Their focus on realistic policies reflects their knowledge of their limitations. Additionally, they possess a good dynamic and work together efficiently. Though their policies and platform have plenty of room to grow, it is clear that they intend to improve and maximize their impact by partnering with other caucuses. Both Dogan and Barry are evidently well-researched and capable, and it is apparent that they hold the potential to be an effective and efficient Sophomore Caucus.

Though Dogan-Barry’s policies do reflect their focus on responsibility and realism, sacrifices are made in terms of creativity and originality. While their idea to consolidate study guides for the student body is helpful, it is also unoriginal. Similarly, their policies involving themed event nights and partnerships with local businesses are within the scope of their abilities but lack creativity. The Dogan-Barry ticket also wants to retain a focus on student engagement. For example, they want to implement a more welcoming platform called Ideanote to anonymously collect students’ complaints. However, this idea requires students to familiarize themselves with the new platform first, which could hinder engagement.

They make up for the lack of uniqueness in their policies through their practicality. Almost all of their policies are reasonable, which is refreshing when compared to some of the other tickets that are still trying to eliminate the headphone policy. The Dogan-Barry ticket’s focus on the smaller aspects, such as more organization days and access to Band-Aids, allows for their objectives to be more rooted in reality, thus making it clear that they intend to fulfill their promises and supporting why The Spectator has chosen to endorse this ticket.