What Is Thelmo Up To This Year?
The Thelomathesian Society started off the semester with their first Senate meeting on Wednesday, Sept. 17, with a new cohort of chairs, senators and club representatives.
The Thelomathesian Society President, Sofia Zareizadeh ’26, shared updates about the student government. “One thing that I’m really proud of this year is that Thelmo has been selected as the 11th most active student government in the nation, which is huge,” she said. “Compared to the last year, I think we have had progress in shifting the students’ perspective on seeing Thelmo not as a student central bank but more as a student government that works to improve campus in many aspects.”
Zareizadeh also highlighted different Thelmo initiatives that she and her team have been working on since last semester. “We are trying to reduce the bias in reviewing contingencies and creating a cultural pass-down of consistency,” she said. In the past semester, the executive board made changes in storage and passed constitutional amendments. At the beginning of this semester, they practiced intentional reach-outs to increase student body diversity in the Senate, leading to a higher number of representatives from athletes and Greek life members. They also aim to increase collaborations by bringing the Intercultural Board of United Voices this semester, according to Zareizadeh.
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Thelmo Central Treasurer, Alexa Santana Lugo ’27, underlined her goals to maximize the use of the decreasing St. Lawrence University Student Activities Fund budget for this semester. “My goal as the central treasurer for the next academic year is to try to make sure that A) We’re the most transparent we can be, B) senators and club reps have perfect information about what’s going on in our finances,” she said. She sees transparency as especially important because the SLUSAF budget decreased with a declining number of students in the incoming first-year class, and the fund is directly proportional to the amount of tuition. “We’re looking at an estimate, because we haven’t had the official number confirmed by the business office, about $30,000 per semester, when we would have had more than $60,000 in previous semesters.”
Santana implemented a new system to display the SLUSAF budget for the Senate and the larger student body. “In previous years, what happened is that the budget announcement was a verbal update of like, we have “X” amount of money left in our contingency fund,” she said. Now, she distributes the budget information, including the remaining budget, the weekly average budget estimations and other details about contingencies, using a visual on Thelmo’s agenda. “As of today, we’re printing this out every week on Wednesdays to have it downstairs in the student center on our bulletin board and make it open to anyone,” she described.
Thelmo Secretary Ngure Ndiritu ’27 is responsible for integrating SLU Central to Thelmo meetings and overall campus activities and taking meeting minutes. “I am in charge of maintaining minutes and records to keep our student leaders accountable to our fellow students,” Ndiritu said. “I am also in charge of streamlining communication between students, faculty and staff, which is why SLU Central has been such an exciting new addition to our campus!”
Zakithi Khumalo ’27, vice president of senate affairs, shared the Senate number for this new term to be 53 members in total, including 25 senators, seven Junior Board members and 21 club representatives. “Compared to Spring 2025, participation has grown by about 21 members, showing an exciting upward trend in student involvement,” she said. “The strong presence of club reps highlights how connected the Senate is to the wider campus community.”
During the first senate meeting of the semester, there were also remarks by administrators on campus for the first time in a few years, including President Kate Morris, Associate Director of Campus Programming and Engagement Alyse Millikan, Associate Dean for Intercultural Engagement, Inclusion and Belonging Lynn Hampton, and Director of Dining Services Marijo Haggett. “Thank you not just for your leadership, but you help me do my job better,” Morris said. She highlighted the Senate’s contributions to university as she spends around a third of her time traveling around the country talking to alumni, parents, friends and donors about students’ thoughts, concerns, and feelings.