Jemark Earle,

VP Student Life

The VP Student Life position is relatively new, created in 2016 when several executive portfolios were restructured. It deals with clubs and services, mental health initiatives, and independent student groups. One of Earle’s major responsibilities is to organize Activities Night, which has been highly successful so far: Fall Activities Night broke attendance records, featuring over 300 groups and clubs.

Winter Activities Night this semester will take on January 16-17. Earle is optimistic about the event, although it will feature slightly fewer clubs and groups than the Fall version and will run for only two days. This time around, Earle is working on a partnership with the newly-launched SSMU Eats app to provide hot drinks for students waiting in line outside.

Activities Night will coincide with another key event for the Student Life portfolio, Mental Health Awareness Week. Earle will be partnering with different groups and services such as Students In Mind, who will be taking the lead on the closing days of the event series. “On the Advocacy and Outreach Committee, we have various members who are part of their departmental health committees,” said Earle, “so we’ve gotten fresh ideas, and we’re collaborating with different departments on some of the events.” In contrast to previous years, he and his organizing team have tried to vary the types of events held during Mental Health Week to attract more students, and to make them more accessible by, for example, scheduling more events in the evening rather than during class time.

A major challenge facing Earle is the SSMU building closure. Last semester, he and his team initially did a poor job of communicating relevant information to building tenants and students at large, sparking confusion and anger. Now, however, it seems that things are going more smoothly – according to Earle, locations have been found for most SSMU services.

“We’re working on getting space for everyone who is a tenant of the building,” he told The Daily. “There are a few outliers that require specific needs, such as Midnight Kitchen, the Players’ Theatre, the Musicians’ Collective, [...] so we’re still working on those because they [...] can’t just go into any building. [...] We’ve spoken to the groups, and [...] if worse comes to worse, they would change their programming for that period of time. [...] Hopefully, by the time September rolls around, we’ll have at least the first few floors back.”