OSCA elects new leaders for College co-op
system
By Annie Stock
The people have spoken and the Oberlin Student Cooperative Association, a
$2 million-a-year corporation, has decided on its new leadership for the 2003-2004 school year.
Beginning June 1, Annie Sorich will serve as OSCA president, Adam Sorkin as treasurer and Maggie
Raife as membership secretary.
This winters election was one of the most competitive OSCA has seen in the past few years.
Approximately 200 of the 265 OSCA members voted on the six students who ran for the three high-level
positions.
Last year only two students ran for Membership Secretary, and candidates for President and Treasury
ran for their positions unopposed.
According to senior Tim Haineswood, OSCA Financial Intern, 2003s Winter Term OSCA President
and Treasurer of OSCA Properties (a sister company of the on-campus OSCA), getting candidates to
run is usually a process of twisting arms.
Usually its like, will someone please run! Haineswood said. Its
a lot of work and not a lot for it.
This year has been a turbulent one for OSCA, which makes the large turnout for candidates even
more surprising. The association got bad press in November for Harknesss involvement in dumpster-diving,
and more recently, when Tank students stole a makeshift stop sign during the blackout.
Avery [Book] and I got together and decided to run, to make it a more democratic process,
newly-elected president Sorich said. We wanted to give people a choice.
President, Treasurer and Membership Secretary are three of the five paying positions in OSCA. They
offer a stipend that is equivalent to one years board bill in a Co-op without taxes, but
the jobs are extremely involved.
You work no less than about 20 hours per week so the pay works out to probably less than
a dollar an hour, OSCA President Rachel Dwarzski said, laughing.
But it has been a great opportunity, she added. I have learned a lot and gotten
experience that I couldnt have gotten anywhere else.
Yet whenever there is a disagreement between the College and OSCA and whenever a co-op has a confrontation
with the police, someone has to take care of it. Someone has to make sure that there is enough
tofu for Fairchild, that garbage isnt piling up in the Harkness kitchen and, at the same
time, keep the College happy and informed. Often, that someone is the OSCA President.
Every year is a crazy year for OSCA, Dwarzski said. There are always ups and
downs.
She added that her relationship with OSCA and her job is a love-hate one.
None of the hate comes from OSCA, she said. Its just the time that I miss
spending with my really close friends, my last semester of my senior year.
President is basically acting as a loose-ends coordinator for all OSCA, Haineswood
said. When I was president, just over Winter Term, I used to have nightmares about the job.
Thats why I only did it for a winter term I couldnt handle the job for a year.
There are greater challenges to the OSCA positions than just the time commitment. Dwarzski and
treasurer Katie Shilton werent prepared for what their jobs would entail when they started
at the end of last year.
My training just wasnt the best, Dwarzski said. [The outgoing President]
just said Youll be fine! but I was definitely lost for a little while.
One of their goals this year has been to develop job manuals to ease the transition into office.
Annie knows shes going to have a lot to deal with, but shes really qualified
for the job, Dwarzski said. Shes been really involved in OSCA on several levels,
so Im really optimistic.
The 2003-2004 school year promises to be an especially interesting one for OSCA. The main challenge
for the incoming officers will be renegotiating OSCAs rent contract. The corporation pays
the college $1,075,000 every year for its rent, and every three years it has to renegotiate that
price. Sorich said the renegotiation, an extremely involved and intensive yearlong process, will
be her biggest task.
There are several other long-term projects on OSCAs plate for the upcoming year. After losing
a large amount of money in the stock market, the corporation recently pulled out all of its investments.
The rest of this year and the next will be spent deciding the future of OSCAs finances.
OSCA is also working toward the establishment of a new co-op, a process that involves a lot of
money and involvement.
Next year is going to be an exciting year for OSCA, Shilton said. OSCA is growing
and changing. That builds dedication and interest. People care about OSCA and want to get involved.
OSCA really means a lot to me, Sorich said. I want to devote all my energy to
it and I know that Ill get the job done.
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