Ryan Shoot: Finances & Operations
Why are you running for finance and operations commissioner at the CSA?
With my involvement this year, in such positions as the president of the College of Social and Applied Human Science Student Alliance, I’ve definitely learned…what the major issues are…With me being more of a mature individual—taking a year off after high school—I now can really see what’s going on at the university and what needs to be done.
Have you had experience with the CSA in the past?
Currently, I’m alternate on [the CSA] board…Other than that, it’s been mainly just CSA clubs.
What do you think that students are looking for from their CSA from their finance and operations commissioner?
I’ve listened to these students for four years, and I’ve heard their voices multiple times, but next year we’re going to have a whole new batch of students…I want to hear their voice as well…What I’d like to enact, is when we go to pick up our bus passes, have tubes and tokens pertaining to different things that students would like their student fees to be spent on. Each student, when they get their bus pass gets a token, you get to take that token to a tube, you put it in the tube, it is visible as where you would like your student fees spent. So different things, and this will have to be discussed throughout the summer.
From your understanding, what is the finance and operations commissioner’s responsibilities?
I see the finances as something that has to be transparent…Our students are giving us a certain amount of student fees every year…They’re giving us those student fees, and as the FnO, I need to make sure that I’m spending those appropriately…I can’t be reacting to what I believe is appropriate—it has to be what my students want.
It sounds like your plan is to wait and see and listen to students.
There’s no way that I can dictate what they want to feel…If I am elected, I’ll be a year out of this university as a student, and I think it’s really important to notice that that year can change a lot. I don’t know what’s going to happen with the government and tuition, I don’t know what’s going to happen on campus…You need to listen to your students, and it’s the most pivotal point of the Central Student Association.
How do you plan on working with the general manager to ensure the maintenance of the corporation and also the maintenance of the student body?
The general manager position to me is still a bit confusing, and I’m sure this will be ironed out eventually. It depends [on] who comes in. You could have someone come in who wants to watch over an executive. You could have someone who comes in and wants to make sure that everyone is completely accountable to every “T” of every letter…I think it’s important that as commissioners…to make sure that we’re keeping ourselves accountable in that position…And I’m really hoping that that’s what the general manager position brings.
How, if elected, you plan on ensuring that more students learn about the CSA?
It’s not exactly in my portfolio to make sure that students are coming to the CSA, I mean, that’s more on the communications commissioner…But as [a] commissioner, it’s important to express myself in a positive manner and show people that this is the positive change that can come out of your student association…If students see that and see the positive change and see us during the events creating amazing things at the university, that will bring the spark back to student leadership.
How do you plan on communicating positively with The Ontarion?
I think the role of The Ontarion, and how we can support The Ontarion, is making sure you’re aware of everything that’s going on…Even asking you to add in a column of CSA events this week…we’re working together all of a sudden to create a community at Guelph where all students can be involved…If the transparency of those events and the committees that are coming together is even greater, it’s going to be amazing to see how much more involvement we have at the university.
Final statement from Ryan Shoot:
Throughout my past four years, I haven’t been and I’m not your average leader. I am a leader who holds himself to the highest standard…I’m not ‘to the book’ all the time, I am a bit off-track, but I’m off-track to a degree that I believe will work…Constantly, in the four years that I’ve been here, a lot of people have said transparency in student fees, but the fact is, I mean it. I think that’s the most important thing I can say to students. Even if students don’t come out…as long as they’re aware that [they] paid this much money and this much is going towards this campaign and this foundation, or this service on campus, then I think I’ve done my role perfectly.