Credit: Alyssa Cooper
Monday’s senate meeting was just shy of 90 minutes, but a few important and meaningful events took place.
Following an overview of the day’s agenda, third-year business administration scholar Kenyana McCray was asked to make her way to the podium to be voted on and sworn in as the Deputy Secretary of the Department of Economic Development.
McCray isn’t new to leadership. Before applying for this position, she served as the President of the Chief Financier’s Organization and Chief Operating Officer of SBI services. In addition to her in-school service, she is also an AltFinance Fellow.
McCray first gave a two-minute overview of her reasoning for applying for the position, her experience and what she planned to do The Chief of Staff initially reached out to McCray, stating that her previous experience and held leadership positions made her a viable candidate for the position.
“I am a part of the Chief Financiers Organization in the school of SBI which is mainly focused on financial literacy for the student body,” said McCray. “I serve as president of that organization this semester.”
McCray also serves as the CEO of SBI Services, a business within the school. Her positions allow her to frequently engage and communicate with the many corporations and sponsors that visit Florida A&M every year.
Elections Committee chairperson, Sen. Justice Johnson then quizzed McCray on her knowledge of the role she was trying to step in.
McCray answered each question to the fullest extent, impressing the handful of senators present at the meeting.
“We are supposed to help with fostering corporate sponsors for events such as Be Out Day and Black Student Summit,” McCray explained when listing her duties as Deputy Secretary.
When asked how she would expose the student body to networking opportunities and encourage entrepreneurship, McCray suggested having a week of entrepreneurs on The Set.
“We would do a week of events and that would be different categories each day,” said McCray.
“One day there will be food vendors. The next day it would be clothing vendors.” When asked if she’d created a list of entrepreneurs to be displayed on the SGA website, McCray answered in the negative, stating that a Google form was being created to make sure that they were established.
The floor then opened to the Senate for questioning. When asked what her goals were for this role, McCray answered simply to fundraise for the A&S funds.
“We don’t have a lot of money but there are ways that we can tap into FAMU itself,” said McCray. “Just our name alone holds a lot of weight, and a lot of alumni are willing to give back, especially SGA alumni.”
The final part of the interrogation involved the pro-con debate. The only hiccup stated by Sen. Tamia William was the lack of a physical list of entrepreneurs on hand in time for the meeting. McCray was unanimously voted into the position of Deputy Secretary.
For the ‘New Business’ segment of the meeting, a potential popular bill for the student body was presented by Sen. Kole Fortson. The bill involves working with the IT Department for fixing the Venom Bus Tracker, a headache for students this past school year.
It was brought up by Senator Hooks that the student body president, Zachary Bell, had brought the issue before the Board of Trustees in their most recent meeting. Sen. Fortson said he’d be willing to work in conjunction with Bell for change.