Mi Gente endorses Drew Flanagan for DSG president

Mi Gente is excited to announce its wholehearted endorsement of Drew Flanagan for Duke Student Government president.

Throughout our meeting, Drew was laser-focused on the needs and demands of the Latinx community and how he could meet them as president. However, Drew has been attentive to our needs for far longer: last semester, he requested to visit one of our executive meetings as SOFC chair to take any feedback and answer questions we had. Even before then, Drew has been vital in work to institutionalize funding for graduation stoles for Latinx graduates as well as Mezcla, our annual Latinx cultural showcase. 

A common frustration among our members is that DSG is not representative of the student body. When asked how he would address this problem, Drew pointed out that he already has  significantly diversified SOFC as Chair. He attributed his success to his emphasis on helping people who do not fit the “DSG/SOFC prototype” see themselves in the role, rather than feel tokenized. Due to his previous success with SOFC, we believe Drew Flanagan would best pave the way for increased Latinx and BIPOC representation in DSG. 

Another important point we appreciated Drew emphasizing was transparency and accountability. Drew emphasized a need for DSG to work harder in sharing what it works on, and had multiple plans to improve this. We were most impressed by the concept of a publicly available spreadsheet, keeping record of progress made on projects over time. 

Just as he has transformed SOFC, we believe Drew is capable of leading a student government in dire need of reform to be more equitable, transparent, and productive. 

Mi Gente would like to thank Lana Gesinsky for her many ideas to make DSG more approachable and transparent, as well as for coming with concrete plans to address some of the 2022 Latinx Student Demands. We look forward to working with the future DSG president. 

Signed,

Sebastian Ochoa and Sophia Vera, Co-Presidents of Mi Gente