Muris Imamovic and Matthew Lulgjuraj said they hope to apply the community-building skills they used as resident assistants at Holy Cross to their positions as president and vice president if elected.
“We have very good community-building with our guys. We got to know our guys and we know what makes them tick,” Imamovic said.
Imamovic, who is running for president of Holy Cross Student Government Association (SGA), is a junior elementary education major from Mishawaka and served as a resident assistant (RA) in Basil Hall this year and as a peer mentor in his sophomore year.
Also a junior elementary education major, Lulgjuraj is from Sterling Heights, Michigan, and is running for vice president. He served as an RA in South Hall and as an SGA senator last year.
Imamovic said the experience of being RAs provided their ticket with key insights on how to work with different students and improve their time at Holy Cross.
“We got to know the pulse of Holy Cross, and what everyone kind of is going for,” he said. “We’d be perfect for being able to build stuff according to different groups.”
Lulgjuraj reiterated that the RA experience has provided a lens to the Holy Cross community for the pair.
“Being [RAs] on campus, we know what community looks like with different students,” Lulgjuraj said. “With Gateways, Driscolls and regular Holy Cross students, we kind of want to build more community within Holy Cross and close that gap.”
Working as a peer mentor strengthened his ability to aid the experience of first-year students at Holy Cross, Imamovic said. As president and vice president, he said “it’s a little bit on us to make the experience as easy going for [first-years] as possible and transitioning to living by themselves.”
Imamovic and Lulgjuraj also hope to see concrete actions taking place as president and vice president and said they would do so by fostering an environment in SGA that is open to new ideas and opinions.
Imamovic said this would mean charting a physical legacy of new additions at Holy Cross brought forth by SGA.
“We want to have cool things added to [Holy Cross] as well,” he said. “We don't want everything to just stay the same every year.”
Having mentioned their excitement about the recent Holy Cross formal, Imamovic said he and Lulgjuraj hope to bring a second big student event to the student body for the fall semester.
“Right away as soon as we get everyone here, [we will] try to do like a really big event or gathering so everyone gets to know each other,” he said. “Maybe even add a second dance or something.”
Lulgjuraj said as vice president, he would like to empower SGA senators in order to achieve more things for the student body.
“There were a lot of ideas that were mentioned and never really went through,” he said about his time as a senator. “We’re really going to push to actually complete things, not just do stuff halfway.”
To get things done on campus, Lulgjuraj said, it is essential the president and vice president use the abilities of SGA senators.
“We have the titles president and vice president but really who gets things done on this campus is our senators,” he said.
Imamovic said they hope to maintain hope to carry on the momentum created by the current SGA president and vice president, Emilee Skidgel and Katie Cole, respectively.
“I think they did a pretty good job, and I think it’s just good to try to keep adding on to that,” he said.
With a long-lasting commitment to the school, Imamovic said he and Lulgjuraj are well-suited to be strong leaders of SGA and succeed Skidgel and Cole.
“I don’t think there are two better people to keep that momentum going forward than us,” he said. “We’ve always been here at Holy Cross.”
Lulgjuraj emphasized that his and Imamovic’s commitment to Holy Cross was uniquely strong and would be brought to their work as president and vice president.
“We always have a good attitude, we’re [Holy Cross] or die.”
