The ASUO Senate’s longest-serving member resigned last week.
Senior Noor Rajabzadeh was elected in 2007 to represent students in nine majors in the College of Arts and Sciences. She was one of only two senators who remained on the Senate after the 2008 election, when seats were redistributed.
Rajabzadeh did not respond to phone messages Sunday and Monday. “She’s kind of in crunch time, in terms of academics,” Senate President Alex McCafferty said.
Rajabzadeh had just 19 days left in her two-year term when her resignation was announced to the Senate. Before she left, she expressed frustration with her colleagues who, despite her experience, ignored her advice and failed to seek it. “They’re always talking about institutional memory, then they never ask me (for advice),” she said after one meeting.
Senators also frequently struggled to pronounce her last name, even during roll calls. At a recent meeting, Sen. Mikey Latteri asked her how to pronounce it. “I probably mispronounced her name lots of times,” McCafferty said.
However, McCafferty said Rajabzadeh never voiced those concerns to him. She was one of three senators who had experience with the 2007-08 Senate. All three resigned this year, but McCafferty attributes their decisions to busy schedules, not problems with the Senate.
Former Sen. Derek Nix, who also resigned in 2009, described Rajabzadeh as “a fantastic senator” and said he is “happy for her.” Nix, who served as the Senate’s intern during Rajabzadeh’s first year, said he doesn’t know why she left, but that her concerns with this year’s Senate were valid. “I can relate to that because I’ve felt the same way,” he said.
McCafferty said there are no plans to appoint Rajabzadeh’s elected successor, Kristine Jensen, before she is scheduled to take office May 25.
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