So this Wednesday, you will elect a new hero to lead you into a bright future – one with a $3 million endowment, a green lawn outside Beckman Institute, and a new best friend named Margo Marshak. My time as ASCIT President will soon come to an end, and I thought this might be an appropriate time to recount the past year, which has been quite eventful for the Caltech undergraduates.

This story begins on December 12, 2001 – the middle of finals week first term last year. At a time when it seemed as if Caltech had forgotten about its students, the typically apathetic undergraduates defied convention, gathering on the Olive Walk for a rally unlike anything in recent memory. More than two hundred students participated, sharing their views by speaking at the open microphone or by writing on banners that were filled three times over. This unexpected and unusual event gave birth to a year unlike anything Caltech has ever seen.

During second term, the Faculty Student Housing Committee organized a series of town hall meetings, visiting each of the student houses to discuss student traditions and housing environments. Continuing the spirit of the December protest, students spoke out strongly defending the traditions of the student houses.

During February, the ad hoc Library Task Force released its report in favor of a centralized library for Caltech campus. When many of its recommendations were ignored, students and faculty found another issue to complain about. As second term ended, little progress seemed to have been made. During finals week, David Baltimore invited student leaders to a meeting previewing a consultant’s report on the student affairs administration at Caltech. The report itself, which called for a new full-time professional Vice-President for Student Affairs, was met with skepticism. However, the opening of the lines of communication provided a glimmer of hope for the future.

As third term began, the administration began feeling increased pressure from many different directions. Prefrosh Weekend loomed on the horizon, and many in the Caltech community expressed a fear that the student unrest would negatively impact Caltech’s reputation. With hundreds of high school students waiting to descend on campus, the administration finally caved to student demands. In a letter to students on April 5, President Baltimore restored freshman parking, reinstated the policies of giving students free catalogs and mailing home their grades, and made guarantees on health insurance and the student house system. A week after Prefrosh Weekend, at the 2002 Student-Faculty Conference, President Baltimore announced that $3 million from the Moore Gift would be placed in an endowment for improving the quality of student life.

While these victories were very satisfying, new issues quickly rose up to take their places. At that Student-Faculty Conference, a growing concern about student morale was uncovered. A week later, the GSC exposed Caltech’s plans to build a wall on Beckman lawn. The undergraduate student body remained dissatisfied with Residence Life policies regarding alcohol and fire. And still, the issue of health insurance lingered.

A few dedicated students served on committees over the summer addressing many of these issues, but the school year started with uncertainty still hanging in the air. In November, a long, hard battle ended in triumph. The big news even reached the Los Angeles Times – Caltech decided not to build Vectors on the Beckman Lawn. After winter break, ending another hard-fought conflict, it was announced that the student health plan would continue unchanged. It is perhaps fitting that these two events straddled the one-year anniversary of the student protest. If there is any lesson to be learned from the past year, it’s that student voices can be heard.

I hope the student body realizes this fact. A little over a year ago, students spoke out and over the past year, the administration has begun to listen. The best thing students can do now is to keep telling Caltech what we want, and the student body desperately needs leaders that are willing to speak up. For those who are thinking about getting involved, I would like to offer some words from the protest that have helped me find my place in student government, “When I came to Tech, I used to hear good things about the administration - that they supported us and our desire to express ourselves and that they understood that this school was a unique environment deserving of a uniquely large amount of student self-government and of respect for our views & needs. Today, I see an unwillingness on the part of the administration to stand up to people who don't understand this - and it is destroying everything that makes this place worthwhile.”

Next year, a majority of the student body won’t have seen the protest, but as long as students keep getting involved, its ideals will not be forgotten.