Student Government Executive Board Candidates 2018

Voting will take place during the week of March 26th. Please review the letters and speeches below.

Speeches from the Candidates for Vice-President:

Sarah Fidelo - Class of 2021

Lori Gruskin - Class of 2020

Letters of Intent from all Candidates

Candidate for President

To the student body,

Over the past several months I have enjoyed meeting and getting to know most of you in this great school!  Even though I have only just touched on the first portion of this four year journey, I have learned a lot and have enjoyed getting to know the faculty and staff in the process.  Being the president of the class of 2021 has been a fun undertaking as it has allowed me to evaluate our class experience and enhance it in every way possible.  Honestly one of the best parts has been listening to many of you individually and getting to know you throughout the process!  I appreciate the opportunity I had as being the class president, and now I ask for your support in voting me in to represent the student body as president.

I have a passion for working with classmates and students towards attaining a common goal, which of course in our case is a D.M.D.  I played a part in this during the years at my previous school as the Pre-Dental Society president.  Not only did I enjoy working with my fellow classmates on our pursuit of dental school, but I also loved new student orientation in which we would present to the incoming freshmen our society’s purpose and dentistry as a whole.  Helping and understanding people is nothing new to me as I’ve had the privilege of teaching over 50 different students the art of piano during the last seven years.  In conclusion, I believe I could be an instrumental part of enhancing the experience of our current student body along with welcoming and helping orient prospective/incoming students into the LECOM family.

Thank you for your consideration!

Michael Dubuc

Candidates for Vice President

To my fellow students at LECOM School of Dental Medicine,

I am humbled to feel a sense of belonging at this school amongst you all. I have never been surrounded by such personable and intelligent people. The passion and skill I’ve witnessed in clinics, to the long boot camp days the D2’s just underwent with stride, to the learning of a completely new trade with the class of 2021. We have all persevered at LECOM with much thanks to our faculty and staff and those that have paved the way before us.

With this being said, my experience thus far as Vice President of the 2021 class has brought my attention to areas of strength and room for improvement at our school. We are fortunate the School of Dental Medicine is relatively new. Faculty and staff are continuously asking for feedback on ways to improve the curriculum and our experience as student doctors. I am very passionate about the happiness and well-being of others and if elected Vice President of the Student Body I intend to integrate the class representatives at LECOM, so all of our concerns can be addressed more accurately. My goal is to achieve the greatest good for the greatest number of people.

We have the components to excel; driven students, qualified and knowledgeable faculty and valuable supporting staff. It is in our best interest to grow LECOM’s reputation as a Dental School, as one day soon this will be our alma mater. If elected Vice President of the Student Body I hope you’ll join me as I aspire to unite our school to get the most out of our experience, alongside promoting LECOM SDM to be the greatest it can be.

-Sarah Fidelo

My name is Lori Gruskin, I am an upcoming D3 and running for SGA Executive Board Vice President. Currently, I am the Secretary on the SGA Executive Board. As the current secretary, I have learned may useful skills that I can use to serve as the Vice President of the Executive Board. This past year I have been in charge of picking the D1/D2 big/little pairs, which was a lengthy process, designed and distributed the “Just Floss It” shirts, been in charge of food catering for all meetings, and am currently in the process of helping to plan a LECOM Dental Prom, and numerous other roles, just to name a few. Being on the executive board this past year has allowed for me to not only meet my expectations, but also exceed them. This past year has been very rewarding; however, after having the opportunity to be secretary, I feel that I would be even better suited to be Vice President, so that I can better voice my opinions within the Executive Board and to all the members of SGA. As Vice President of the Executive Board, I will continue to make the students a priority, and help plan events that will be of benefit to the students, both academically and socially. As a student of LECOM, we all deserve an experienced leader who will continually raise and address the concerns of the students to the administration. As Vice President of SGA, I will be able to do just that. All in all, I pledge to work with the SGA President and administration to address all of the concerns of students to make LECOM the best it can be. Thank you for your support!

-Lori Gruskin

Candidate for Secretary

I am writing this to express my interest in running for Secretary of the LECOM SDM SGA. Over the past 9 months since starting at LECOM I have learned a few lessons about myself that I believe provides me the ability to work effectively as your SGA Secretary. The first, I am sure many of you can relate to- being dead tired 24/7.  We are constantly bombarded with some aspect of education to ensure that we can become the absolute best clinicians possible. In my prolonged state of exhaustion, I have developed as a student who is willing to continuously work to ensure I achieve the most out of my experience here. I believe that the Secretary should be willing to do just that, work with the fellow SGA members to ensure that every SDM student is able to achieve the most out of their time here (after all, we may need to sell a kidney by the end of it). The second lesson I learned stemmed from my exhaustion; I cannot do this alone. I believe camaraderie is vital to each of our successes. The willingness to not only give help when asked but perhaps more crucial, is the willingness to ask for help when you need it. The position of Secretary I believe is a great depiction of that mindset. The Secretary’s foremost goals should be to aid in organization, communication, and transparency between students, faculty, and the SGA. I believe the camaraderie I have developed would be of great value in seeing to it that communication and transparency are achieved as Secretary. Finally, the third lesson I have learned that is perhaps the only word that is of actual value when applying for a Secretary position, organization. Being tired, needing camaraderie, simply fosters organization because without it, I would be up a creek needing to sell the other kidney (an issue when we only have two).  I believe my organizational skills: timliness, clarity, clear thoughts, and time management would be a tremendous benefit to the SGA in seeking to provide the best experience for us as students. In summary, I am great team player who knows my weaknesses, willing to ask for help to see to it that we as students leave here as capable, highly motivated doctors. Thank you.

-Caleb Robinson

Candidate for Treasurer

Hello LECOM student body! My name is Logan Rutch and I am running for SGA student body treasurer. I have not served on SGA through the duration of my first year, however I stayed involved with SGA and their events in various ways. In my undergraduate studies I have served as Student Government Class President and Pre-professional society treasurer. If elected, I plan to continue to keep the finances and transactions sharp, and communicate the budget with SGA routinely. With these standard procedures, we will be able to allocate our funds accordingly. The student organizations we have at LECOM SDM are very important to who we are, and the great diversity we have within our student body. With a clean and balanced treasury, we will continue to grow our clubs, extracurricular activities and student interactions. Thank you for this opportunity and support.I am very excited to see where the upcoming academic year takes us. 

-Logan Rutch

Candidate for Webmaster

To my fellow students at LECOM SDM,
I am writing to express my intent for running for Webmaster for LECOM SDM SGA. I have currently been serving as the Web Contributor for the LECOM SDM Class of 2021 and I would like to continue to serve the student body at LECOM SDM. In my time as Web Contributor I feel that I have been able to progress my knowledge of updating the LECOM SDM website so that it can be utilized by the student body, as well as be able to give prospective students more information about LECOM SDM. I have also worked with helping send out the weekly announcements so our student body can stay updated on the events and club meetings that take place here at the SDM. Thank you for taking your time and I would greatly appreciate your vote for this opportunity. 

-Austin Askey