NVU-Lyndon senior Dan Carneiro, the current Campus Activities Board (CAB) President, is ready to pass the torch to a new Executive Board after the club hosted elections on March 22. Ten students attended the meeting, CAB’s highest number of general board attendees this year. Together, they elected Renee Chaples as President, Erica Shea as Director of Recruitment and Membership, Dakota McWee as Marketing Director, and Cheyenne Riley as Budget Manager for the 2021-2022 academic year. John Currier was also elected to serve as CAB’s Student Government Representative for the remainder of the Spring 2021 semester.
Carneiro has been an executive board member of CAB for the past three years. He’s experienced many ups and downs with the club, from going to conferences to struggling to find any members.
“We finally have some form of a general board this semester… finally we’re getting somewhere, and it’s my last semester.” – Dan Carneiro
He told The Critic that his time with CAB has been fun and he wishes it could continue. However, as Carneiro prepares to graduate this spring, he needs to pass the torch, and he’s excited to do so. “I’m excited just by Renee [Chaples] being here and helping with CAB this semester,” he said. “Renee with her speech started to make me tear up… I know everything’s going to be fine.”
Chaples will be taking over as CAB President in the coming weeks. She has been on the general board of CAB for the past two years since she arrived at NVU-Lyndon. When she first joined the club, she admits to not knowing what she was getting herself into. “As I grew in other student leadership roles, I learned what CAB was supposed to be–an event planning-based club on campus–and I felt there was a big disconnection between general board members and executive board members,” she said. Chaples took the opportunity to get to know this year’s executive board and advisor on a more personal level to bridge that divide, making club meetings more active and engaging.
Through her club membership, job as an RA, and election to the Student Government, she found a passion in eventing planning that inspired her to run for President. “It is probably one of my favorite things. I love bringing smiles to people’s faces, seeing them at events, being able to see new people at events; it’s just one of my absolute favorite things in the world,” she told The Critic.
Chaples was elected as the new CAB President in an 8-2 vote.
Joining Chaples on the executive board will be Erica Shea, a first-year transfer student to NVU-Lyndon this spring semester. Shea was an active member of CAB at Landmark College, having experience as a general board member, secretary, and vice president. Her goal with joining CAB at NVU-Lyndon was to integrate herself more into campus life, and when she found out elections were right around the corner, she jumped at the opportunity to get more involved.
“I just feel like I need to give back to wherever I am,” Shea said. “I love hosting activities. I’ve actually pitched some ideas to [the current executive board] already that they’re going to run for Spring Day.” She describes herself as very organized and is excited to bring new ideas to the table from her past experiences.
“We’re always going to check-in with each other and balance each other out; make sure none of us are over-stressed or over-doing things.” -Erica Shea
In a 9-0 vote, Shea was elected as the Director of Recruitment and Membership for next year.
Dakota McWee, a first-year student, was also elected to the CAB executive board for the 2021-2022 academic year, serving as the club’s Marketing Director. Earlier in the year, McWee tried his hand as the SGA Representative, but “didn’t feel as if it was the right role” for him.
In this new role, McWee hopes to spread the word of CAB events more effectively. “It’s hard to know when something is going on besides looking at the little calendars,” he said, referring to CAB’s monthly calendars posted around campus, The Buzz table tents, and advisor Mike Secreti’s weekly emails. “If you want people to know what’s going on, you have to have something blowing up in their face… I feel like as the Director of Marketing, I can make that happen.”
McWee will be taking this position after a 7-2 vote by the CAB general board.
Cheyenne Riley is a second-year student who was elected to serve CAB as the 2021-2022 Budget Manager. Riley currently serves as CAB’s Director of Marketing and moves into this new position with confidence, according to Shea. She did not respond to The Critic’s request for comment.
Riley was voted into this new position with a vote of 9-1.
CAB’s general board also elected an SGA Representative for the remainder of the current academic year. This vacant role has pushed its responsibilities onto other Executive Board members. Now, however, John Currier will be picking up that slack as CAB’s SGA Representative for the remainder of the spring semester. Currier served on the CAB board prior to taking a year of medical leave from NVU.
He was elected into the position 7-0. One general board member abstained in this vote.
The SGA Representative position for the 2021-2022 year remains vacant. Chaples says that the SGA Representative is “one of the most important roles” any club has and hopes to have that filled soon. The responsibilities will be divided between the other CAB executive board members until someone is elected into that position. Currier expressed interest pending his experience with the SGA this semester and AMS executive board elections, a club that takes priority to him over CAB.
For the upcoming academic year, all of the new CAB executive board members told The Critic that they hope to be planning more outside, in-person events in a “best-case scenario,” keeping in mind the COVID-19 pandemic. In particular, Shea is interested in hosting more lawn games, outside dodgeball, and hula hoop competitions–activities to get students outside and moving around.
Chaples started a Halloweek tradition with other student leaders this past fall and hopes to bring that event under CAB’s umbrella to make it “fresh and new every year we have it.” She also wishes to create more collaborative relations between CAB and the other clubs across campus. “A lot of clubs have been struggling, not only with coming up with ways to host events but also with student engagement,” she said. Her hope is to create one collaborative event with each club per semester at minimum; Chaples plans to reach out to club presidents in May regarding this idea.