The Associated Students of Highline College (or ASHC for short) have been informing students of the changes and events made during the pandemic.
The ASHC is the Student Government for Highline, representing students’ interests and concerns regarding the college’s community and administration.
The AHSC consists of the president, Jarmaine-A Santos, Vice President Hector Pina, and Speaker of the Caucus Kayla Pezolano.
During the last couple of months, the ASHC have been keeping students updated about what has happened and what will happen concerning Highline’s plans for its students through email, while also keeping students posted about the presidential election.
“The Associated Students of Highline College have been hard at work in building community, promoting voting awareness, mental health awareness, and debunking voting myths,” said Hector Pina, the student vice president.
“During these times of dealing with the pandemic and presidential elections, we want to assure the student body that we are doing everything we could to help and provide resources for them to utilize.”
To connect to the Highline community, the ASHC have been creating online events to meet with fellow students throughout the year.
The ASHC have collaborated with the Global Student Ambassadors, a group of students who plan programs to reach out to the diverse community on campus, to connect with the Highline community online.
The Global Student Ambassadors comprise students Imelda Castellano, Anish Ghimire, Miles Pham, and Anita Wambui.
“We are also building relationships with students, staff, and faculty by assisting and facilitating virtual zoom events such as Cooking with Global Student Ambassador featuring Mexico, that Imelda hosted along with Anita and me,” said Pina.
“We plan on making more virtual zoom events throughout the academic year and hope more students will come and participate.”
One of the problems that the ASHC has faced is not being able to connect with the students frequently because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“One of the main challenges I believe ASHC has had is not engaging with the student body as much as we want,” said Pina. “Due to the pandemic, we have limited opportunities to get to know our student body more.”
Regardless of the struggles, the student government has opened online Zoom meetings for students that have any questions or concerns to communicate with its students as much as possible.
““The Associated Student of Highline College understands the circumstances in which students are put in, which is why Jarmaine, Kayla and I have our office hours available to any student that has questions or concerns,” said Pina.
“The ASHC is actively working on other creative ways to engage with students more, either through events, office hours, or spotting us in our virtual zoom class.”