SGA President Samad Gillani and his cabinet completed their first quarter in office about two weeks ago. In their first three months on the job, the administration has worked on fulfilling several campaign promises.
Gillani was elected the 113th SGA president in April 2024, winning with over 90% of the vote. Gillani ran on a platform of improving academic excellence, student equity, community collaboration, campus life and transparency, and internal operations.
Gillani said he prioritizes introducing students to experiences that would have gone unnoticed without SGA promoting them.
“It’s all about introducing new opportunities for collaboration and plugging our UA students into places where they might not have gone before without interaction with the SGA,” Gillani said. “Earlier this summer, at a meeting with Helena Duncan in the Business Council of Alabama, I talked about keeping UA students at UA after graduation, making sure that they give their resources back.”
The administration has also set its sights on addressing the challenges brought about by AI.
“I’ve been working with Dr. Han in the Provost Office and the new center for AI research on campus to help develop some standardized rules across campus for AI use going forward,” Gillani said.
One of Gillani’s key promises while running for office concerned student mental health. In an interview with The Crimson White prior to the presidential election, Gillani mentioned that he would advocate for two mandatory mental health days across campus.
Morgan Patrick, Gillani’s press secretary, said that the policy has not been enacted, but that Gillani is still actively advocating for it.
“I understand and I recognize that mental health is an incredibly important aspect of our students’ lives, and sometimes, as busy students on a busy campus, we just need a simple break,” Gillani said. “My goal as president will be to advocate for our students and make sure that they have all the necessary resources provided to them by the University to make sure that they can thrive in their academics.”
Gillani said his team is working on various opportunities for students’ mental wellness. One of these is the Capstone Wellness Explorer Program, which is based on the Alabama Wellness Model developed by Ruperto Perez, associate vice president of student health and wellbeing, and his Advisory Council on Wellness.
“That [the program] will allow students the opportunity to delve into seven different realms of campus and wellness life, given the opportunity to explore different student organizations and different clubs and programming initiatives that they might not have interacted with before,” Gillani said.
Teegan Mathey, Gillani’s chief of staff, believes that she and Gillani made the right choices in choosing the cabinet members for the upcoming year despite a “really rigorous” application process.
“Honestly, some of the ideas that people presented to us were so fantastic that they shaped the way that we saw our administration going,” Mathey said.
Gillani emphasized that he and his team are committed to working for the betterment of the Capstone. The three years he spent in the SGA and as a student at the Capstone has helped and shaped his platform and his goals for a better university, he said.
“I’ve made it a commitment — a personal commitment and a campaign commitment — to make sure to try to meet with as many individuals and student organizations as possible. And I want to remind students of my commitment to that platform and to the idea and the mission I have of creating one UA,” Gillani said.
