GISA Treasurer Candidate: Sourou Aristide Djossou

By The Graduate Press Editorial Board

The spring 2023 Graduate Institute Student Association (GISA) Board election cycle is underway, with candidates running for the positions of President, VP of Master’s, Treasurer, Events Coordinator, and Professional Development Committee (PDC) President.

GISA serves as the voice and principal events organizer for the student body at the Graduate Institute. Members of the GISA board are responsible for hearing student concerns regarding academic and student life, accommodations, and various other issues at the Institute. From April 28th to 30th, IHEID students will have the opportunity to vote online for the candidates they wish to represent them on the GISA Board for the subsequent year. The Graduate Press has reached out to all of the candidates running for the GISA Board this spring and through a series of articles, we will be sharing their platforms. It is crucial that IHEID students engage with the candidates and participate in this year’s election in order to ensure the GISA Board can meet all of the needs of present and future IHEID students. 

We spoke to Sourou Aristide Djossou, who is running for GISA Treasurer. Here is what he had to say.

Why do you think you are the best candidate for the role of Treasurer? 

I will answer this question by saying first why I am a qualified candidate, and then why I’m the best. I am a qualified candidate for two reasons, my education background and experience in this field. I have a bachelor’s degree in business law. During my undergraduate years, I held the position of treasurer in the university student body. I think I am the best candidate given my expertise in grant writing, that I will put into contribution to get external funds into GISA’s account. I will not only focus on managing the financial resources of GISA, but I will bring supplementary funds and expand the budget. 

How will your experiences as a student at the Institute shape your approach to the role as Treasurer?

Student initiatives have many great ideas, but cannot implement all of them because of limited financial resources. So it is very necessary to help them to have access to external funds. I will assist them to get more funds to implement more projects than what they are doing now. 

What other experience do you have that you believe qualifies you for the role of Treasurer?

This position framed as treasurer in practice requires the holder to be a financial auditor and play the attribution devoted to a treasurer at the same time. As a former financial auditor in a consultancy firm from 2020-2022, I think the experience acquired in financial auditing sector is going to be highly useful in this position. 

If elected, what would be your primary goal as Treasurer?

My primary goal as treasurer is going to be, like I said, to get supplementary funding for all our student initiatives in order to carry more activities for the best interest of this student community.