With the school year coming to a close, Adam Vinson ’25 reflected on his takeaways from serving as executive vice president of the Student Assembly.
“[Much of my job involved] trying to find unity in a very divided atmosphere, and I think that overall I succeeded in doing that,” Vinson said.
Vinson is a senior majoring in environment and sustainability with a concentration in environmental policy and governance. He served as the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences representative in his junior year before being elected EVP. During his time in the Assembly, he also served as the chair of the Environmental Committee.
Addressing National Events With Assembly Resolutions
During his two years in the Assembly, Vinson saw the passage of many resolutions, but he specifically noted the significance of recent Assembly actions to respond to federal policies and events.
One of the resolutions that stood out to Vinson was Resolution 37, “Protecting Immigrant Students.” Resolution 37 passed on March 6 and called on the University to protect undocumented, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, international, refugee and other immigrant students through various programs and training.
The resolution came amid concerns for the safety of international students following numerous executive orders issued by the Trump administration and an Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid that occurred in Ithaca.
Vinson hopes that “the Assembly next year continues down with resolutions like Resolution 37” because “what happens on a national level winds up trickling down to students, so ignoring it would be foolish.”
Vinson also referenced spearheading Resolution 33, a response from the Assembly to the Department of Education’s Feb. 14 “Dear Colleague” letter, which instructed schools to eliminate “racial preferences” and otherwise race-conscious decisions in areas including admissions, hiring and institutional programming within two weeks or risk losing federal funding.
Resolution 33 called on the University to resist the ED guidance and to “protect all the organizations that would fall under the Trump administration’s definition of [diversity, equity and inclusion],” Vinson said.
When he was looking for representatives to cosponsor the resolution, Vinson said, “There were a lot of people who disagreed with each other [personally], … but they all signed on. At the end of the day, even if we disagree, we’re supposed to represent the student body at large, and the student body at large will support certain things.”
Resolution 33 ultimately passed with over 25 cosponsors.
‘High Hopes’ for Incoming Leadership
Vinson described that the next academic year is a byline funding year where the Assembly will work on allocating funds to its byline organizations, which are umbrella organizations that receive direct funding from the Student Activity Fee to collectively support over 700 groups on campus.
“I sympathize with whoever the incoming V.P. of finance is. They have a really difficult job ahead of them. I think, obviously, the national environment is gonna have a big impact,” Vinson said.
The V.P. of finance is appointed from the pool of elected representatives by an internal vote from the members of the Assembly.
Although Vinson said that he does not know how next year’s Assembly is going to operate, he has “high hopes” for next year’s Assembly that will be led by returning president, Zora deRham ’27 and incoming-EVP Christian Flournoy ’27.
“They’ve shown they're very capable. They’re very good at reaching out to constituencies that don’t feel heard and bringing them to the table,” Vinson said, pointing to their outreach to student-athletes.
“I hope that they continue the path that I sort of started pushing for more solutions relating to national issues,” he said.
Passing on Institutional Knowledge
Vinson shared concerns that the Assembly lacks “institutional knowledge” that he has seen become lost “several times now.”
Institutional knowledge of how the Assembly operates is built up over years of experience, Vinson said. He noted that many people are not returning due to not getting enough petition signatures to run, losing reelection or deciding to step down.
Vinson explained that he has met with Flournoy to go over the new version of the governing documents to carry his institutional knowledge forward.
Vinson advised incoming Student Assembly members to read the Assembly governing documents, even though it is not mandatory, because “you can't be good at [your job] if you don’t read them.”
“I do think things will work out. Especially since the Assembly’s charter, bylaws and standing rules are living documents, they’re always changing. It changes from assembly to assembly,” he said.
‘A Voice That Represents You’: Vinson Urges Students to Vote
Based on his time as an undergraduate student serving the Assembly, Vinson had one final statement to Cornell’s student body.
“Please vote in our elections because it’s always a low turnout,” Vinson said. “How much money for all these different organizations that you love depends on us, and we’re your voice to the administration. If you don’t vote, you’re not going to get a voice that represents you.”
