AS vice president, directors leave post

The Associated Students at Santa Monica College are left with three vacant positions after the vice president and two directors stepped down within the last two months due to personal reasons.

Jesus Vasquez, vice president, Emmitt Rivers, director of student services, and London Tran, director of academic support and shared governance, have resigned since the end of the fall semester.

“I think overall, people have resigned because they have limitations on their times," said Vasquez.

Vasquez, who was attending to personal matters at the time, informed the AS of his resignation on the first day of the semester.

“I resigned because I wanted to be more fair to AS,” he said.

Vasquez said his main focus will be helping campus groups he considers underrepresented, such as the Black Collegians and the Latino Center. He will continue working with the AS in some capacity, he said.

Rivers said that he began contemplating resignation toward the end of the fall semester, and made the decision to leave his position because he felt he "should be doing something different."

“I didn’t want to come back to AS and not put in as many hours as last semester, and not be as enthralled,” said Rivers.

Instead, Rivers will divide his time between the Black Collegians organization and performing in school productions.

Tran said he originally had no intentions of returning to SMC this semester. He decided to pursue an idea he had for a social networking start-up program.

“To be honest, being in AS wasn’t really helping me,” Tran said.

He ultimately decided to return to SMC, and is currently looking at beginning a club on campus focused on developing start-ups or business ideas.

“I can create something that’s not been done before, and that’s more important,” he said.

Although Tran said he felt his work for AS was meaningful, Tran hoped to start something original.

"Being in AS is not creating something new," he said.

AS president Parker Jean described the vacancies as a “flashback” to fall semester, when three directors resigned before the start of the term.

But Jean is also understanding of his peers' obligations outside of AS.

“If some of them were to stay, they wouldn't be able to fulfill their duties,” he said.

Jean will take on the AS director role of academic support and shared governance until the position is filled.

Thursday marked the last day to turn in applications for AS positions.