The Student Assembly opened its 2026-2027 term on Thursday by electing committee chairs, adopting new standing rules and outlining plans to increase member accountability and student engagement.
The Thursday meeting was the first regular meeting led by President Eeshaan Chaudhuri ’27 and Executive Vice President Hayden Watkins ’28, who were elected last spring after campaigning in part on improving the Assembly’s internal operations and restoring student trust.
“I’m really excited for the year [and I’m] excited that we had a lot of participation across the board,” Chaudhuri said in an interview with The Sun. He pointed to the number of contested committee chair races and members volunteering for liaison positions as an encouraging sign for the new term.
“Generally, we don’t usually have this many contentious races for chairs,” Chaudhuri said. “It’s always a really big struggle to fill these liaison positions and University Assembly positions, so that’s really nice to see.”
Assembly Adopts New Standing Rules
The Assembly unanimously adopted Resolution 1, which establishes its standing rules for the 2026-2027 term.
The rules govern the Assembly’s internal procedures, including meetings, absences, voting, the legislative process and committee operations. Voting members must belong to at least two Student Assembly or University Assembly committees. Absences from Executive Board meetings will also count towards Executive Board members’ attendance records.
Assembly leadership highlighted changes intended to increase committee participation and update portions of the governing documents, including revisions to outdated language and pronouns.
Vice President of Communications Alexander Walters ’28 outlined one such change: a proposed engagement point system that would track whether members fulfill outreach and participation requirements.
Under the proposed system, members would receive points for completing responsibilities such as constituent outreach, tabling and participating in Assembly programming. Members who fail to meet these requirements could lose their voting privileges.
Chaudhuri emphasized that the system is not intended to create new responsibilities but rather to enforce duties that already exist in Assembly governing documents.
“There’s so many things that the Student Assembly is supposed to do and just hasn’t done,” Chaudhuri said in an interview with The Sun after the meeting. He cited an existing requirement for an Assembly-wide outreach event each semester, saying he had never seen one held during his time at Cornell.
“I want this point system to be a system where it’s just a checklist for members so they actually know what their roles and responsibilities are [and] a signal to people to get with the program because it's time to get to work,” Chaudhuri said.
Assembly Elects Committee Chairs
Much of Thursday’s meeting was devoted to filling committee leadership positions.
Julian Kimball ’28, the Duffield College of Engineering representative, was elected chair of the Dining Services Committee after telling members that his experience with food allergies shaped his interest in making Cornell Dining accessible to students with dietary restrictions based on culture, religion and allergies.
Saanya Agarwal ’27, the women’s issues representative, was selected to continue as co-chair of the Student Health Advisory Committee. Agarwal discussed her work with Cornell Health during the previous term and said she hoped to continue addressing barriers to student healthcare, including transportation to Cornell Health from North Campus.
Jai Anand ’29, representative at-large, was elected chair of the Environmental Policy Committee and Walters was selected to lead the Academic Policy Committee.
Jana Orief ’29, the minority students representative, won a contested election to chair the Technology Committee, which serves as the Assembly’s primary body for undergraduate input on University technology policy, including generative artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, digital platforms and accessibility. The committee was created last fall.
Saphira Augustin ’29, the first-generation college students representative, was elected chair of the Financial Aid Review Committee. Augustin pointed to difficulties students face regarding which expenses financial aid will cover, including travel to and from Cornell.
Augustin said she hoped the committee could make information about available assistance clearer and push the University to address financial aid gaps.
Amelia Lyons ’29, the College of Architecture, Art & Planning representative, won a three-way race to chair the Student Assembly Infrastructure Fund Commission. This commission evaluates applications to the Student Assembly Infrastructure Fund that finances infrastructure projects around campus.
During debate over the chair election, Vice President for Finance Christian Tarala ’27 described the commission as “probably the most important committee” on the Assembly because of its ability to directly fund projects.
“As opposed to our other committees, where we’re lobbying other people,” Tarala said. “We have money and we can pay for it. We can make it happen.”
Darin Lee ’28 was elected chair of the International Student Affairs Committee. Lee said he hopes to improve communication between international students and University offices on immigration documents, employment and other issues affecting students coming to Cornell from abroad. Lee, who is from Hong Kong and Malaysia, currently serves as the Assembly’s international students representative.
Watkins was elected chair of the Campus Pulse Committee, where he said he wants to use both surveys and in-person outreach to better understand student concerns about campus culture.
The Assembly also filled seats on University Assembly committees and student health advisory bodies and confirmed non-assembly member Xavier Rolston ’28 as deputy director of elections.
Emma Spindler is a member of the Class of 2028 in the College of Arts and Sciences. She is a senior writer for the news department and can be reached at espindler@cornellsun.com.
