On Thursday, April 9, Oakland University Student Congress (OUSC) swore in President-elect Cullen Black and Vice President Autumn Baker, in addition to Valentine Fayette-Étés, for another term as Speaker of the Legislature.
The new administration seeks to strengthen executive and legislative cooperation in the OUSC to improve its engagement with the student body.
The Black-Baker ticket ran against the Johnson-Lasecki write-in ticket, earning 137 of the 168 votes cast for President.
Cullen Black, a second-year history major and French minor, previously served as Judiciary Chair of the OUSC, in addition to being Poli-ed Director for the Young Democratic Socialists of America at OU (YDSA). Black’s other accomplishments on the OUSC include connecting students to free resources on campus like the Free Menstrual Product Initiative, academic and health services, introducing a bill to allocate funds for OU’s beaver project and strengthening outreach.
“When I am in the student congress office on any given day, come next fall, students are completely welcome to come in and bother me about anything. I want talking to people, ultimately, to be my priority—whether that’s hearing out student concerns or negotiating with admin,” Black said.
Autumn Baker, a second-year physics major, is also a member of YDSA and served as an OUSC Legislator in the previous term. As the Vice President of For Oakland, a student organization committed to promoting voter-engagement, Baker brings experience in advocacy, constituent-relationship building and voter education.
Black’s and Baker’s experiences align with a vision of an involved student body where feedback systems improve OUSC-led initiatives.
“It’s really just a continuation of what we’ve done in Congress and in other orgs,” Black said regarding the Black-Baker ticket’s extensive outreach leading up to the election. “Just going out and talking to people—seeing what people cared about.”
Baker, who delivered a remark at the OUSC inauguration on April 9, cited a precedent for the type of civic investment needed on campus. She referenced a previous meeting held by the Oakland County Board of Commissioners, where attendees protested a 13-4 vote by the board for an AI-drone piloting program to be headed by the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office.
“I saw an incredibly strong community that came together and protected each other and provided for each other the resources that they needed to make their voices heard, to speak truth to power, to enact the change that they need—that we all need, to protect us,” Baker said regarding the attendees who raised privacy concerns over the resolution.
The resilience of these Oakland County residents reinforced Baker’s commitment to honing a more balanced candidate-constituent relationship, where “the people who hold the power know where it really comes from.”
Accountability, accessibility and affordability are the “Triple A’s” of the Black-Baker slate.
“I get the sense that Student Congress has developed a reputation for being very insular, very internal, not marketing itself to the student body really at all. So my number one priority, my number one goal for this administration, is just cleaning out inventory, quite frankly,” Black said.
“We want to give students all the free stuff that is afforded to them by virtue of having a student congress that cares about them.”
In addition to the presidential election, several legislators were elected to OUSC. Among them are Ethan Vela, D.J. Williams, Bernadette Wolf, Allison Drzewiecki, Javier Rosario, Rosemary Rais, Pearl Oprah, Emily Lunger, Vincenzo Martino, Morgan Mueller, Wasey Rehman, Angel Perez and Isaiah Howell, who were involved in the Black-Baker presidential ticket.
OUSC has an eventful year ahead, and the OU community is excited to see what projects the organization will accomplish. For more information, follow OUSC on Instagram @ouscofficial. Additionally, students can check out the Black-Baker slate’s Instagram page @blackbakerou.
