President | Yousr Dhaouadi (email)
Yousr is a fourth-year Ph.D. candidate in chemical engineering in the Department of Biomedical and Chemical Engineering. She was elected as the Graduate Student Organization (GSO) president after serving as GSO comptroller for two years. She also served as the GSO financial secretary in 2018-2019. Yousr is an international student from Tunisia who lived in the United Arab Emirates prior to coming to Syracuse University. She transferred from American University of Sharjah in the UAE to Syracuse University in 2015 as an undergraduate in chemical engineering, earned a bachelor’s degree in 2017 and then enrolled in the Ph.D. program in 2018. She is conducting research in Professor Dacheng Ren’s lab with a focus on understanding persister cells residing in biofilms and involved in the resistance of chronic bacterial infections. She is excited to continue with GSO and serve graduate students in her new role!
VP Internal Affairs | Daniel J Kimmel (email)
Daniel J. Kimmel (they/them) is a fourth year Ph.D. student in the Department of Religion. Daniel studies the history of religions in the classical and late ancient Mediterranean (c.500 BCE to 500 CE). Their research interests include ancient magical traditions, daemonologies, ritual and rhetoric, and the (ancient) intellectual history of the concept of “religion.” Daniel will be teaching an undergraduate course called “Ancient Magic” come Spring 2022.
Prior to becoming GSO Internal Vice President, Daniel served for three years as a University Senator, and as the Graduate Representative on the 2021 Vice Chancellor, Provost, and Chief Academic Officer Search Committee. In the Department of Religion, they have served several years as Co-President of the Religion Graduate Organization, and as the organization’s Admissions Representative. Daniel adores their divinanimal companions, St. Antoni of Guilford (German Shepherd) and St. Sebastian of Bethlehem (ball python) and will gladly provide pictures of them upon request.
VP External Affairs | Brittnee Alexis Johnson (email)
Brittnee A. Johnson is a Candidate for a Masters in Public Administration at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, concentrating in social policy. In May 2021, she received her B.A. with Distinction Honors in Political Science from Syracuse University, with her thesis analyzing color-blind education policies in urban school districts. While obtaining her undergraduate degree, she served as Community Engagement Chair for the Student Association as well as Student Advisor to the Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer. As the External Vice President for this academic year, she hopes to bring graduate students together, while making sure that students of color and international students feel welcomed and represented at Syracuse.
Apart from GSO, Brittnee is the 2021 – 2022 Community Engagement Coordinator for the Black Graduate Student Association as well as a member of the Graduate School BIPOC Alliance for Excellence. She is looking forward to serving alongside the rest of the Executive Board and getting to know the graduate student community!
Comptroller | Joy Burton (email)
Joy Burton is a second-year masters in media studies student at S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications. She graduated with a degree in journalism and public relations from Indiana University in May 2020. In the 2020-21 school year at Syracuse, Joy was a teacher’s assistant, a research assistant, and treasurer of the Newhouse Master’s Association. Joy is co-chair of the University Senate student life committee, a member of the University Senate budget committee, and chair of the GSO finance committee. Joy is an audience development intern at NBC News Digital, and in the past, she was a reporter and photographer at the Indiana Daily Student and the Arnolt Center for Investigative Journalism. She has also worked for a handful of nonprofits and small businesses in marketing and public relations. Joy will be graduating at the end of this school year.
Recording Secretary| Linzy Andre (email)
Linzy is a second-year doctoral student in Counseling and Counselor Education within the School of Education. Linzy is the travel grant committee chair, and serves on the diversity committee. She is chapter president of the Sigma Upsilon Chapter of Chi Sigma Iota, Program Initiatives Coordinator of the Syracuse University Counselors for Social Justice, and an Orange Holmes Scholar. She is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor and a proud New Yorker. Both her master’s and bachelor’s were earned at Hunter College a City University of New York. In 2019, she founded her own psychotherapy practice, Sunshine Advocacy, to extend access to the intimate experience of therapy to clients from communities like the ones she grew up in. She currently balances school, leadership and her practice, and aims to be the change she wants to see in the world.
Financial Secretary| Shiila Seok Wun Au Yong (email)
Shiilā Seok Wun Au Yong (they/ she) is a third year Ph.D. student in Cultural Foundations of Education at the School of Education. Their research interests include disability studies, critical pedagogy, transnational feminist theory, black feminist thought, postcolonial studies, and storytelling. Born and raised in Malaysia as a third generation Chinese descent, their filmmaking interest lies in telling compelling human stories by combining both fiction and non-fiction elements, exploring queer identities, diaspora and sense of belongings.
Shiilā first came to Syracuse University as a graduate student 2016 under Fulbright scholarship to pursue their MFA in Film. They have been an active member of GSO since then, and has served as a University Senator since 2019. Prior to that, they have also been an active member of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, and Asexual (LGBTQA) Justice and Advocacy committee as a graduate student representative. They have also served as a member at Syracuse University Advisory Committee on Public Safety between 2019-2021. Shiilā is excited to be the GSO financial secretary this year and look forward to serving with the E-board members!