President of the Graduate Student Organization (GSO), Rob Gersch, has announced that he will officially resign from his position as President on Feb. 12.
His resignation comes a little more than a month after former President Ryan Soule resigned on Dec. 24 of last year.
Gersch’s decision was not surprising to the GSO, he said, as they had known he would only be able to serve for a short while when he was appointed. “They knew about it from the get go. It probably wouldn’t surprise them that much at all,” he said.
While he only recently became President of the GSO, when Soule stepped down last month, he had served as the GSO’s Vice-President since Summer 2007.
Gersch’s reason for resigning is simple: he’ll be graduating within a few months. He is finishing up his dissertation and is expecting to graduate by March with his PhD.
Although his term has been short, both as Vice-President and President, Soule said that any time Gersch could give was helpful. “I knew having him on board for even six months was more important than not having him available to serve the student body at all,” Soule said.
Soule also had to resign from his post as President last year due to academic responsibilities.
He had intended to serve his term in full, but was offered admission to Northeastern University School of Law this spring semester. Having already completed his Master’s degree, he accepted the offer. He said that attending Northeastern had been one of his goals all along.
Since he accepted the offer from Northeastern, he was no longer a graduate student at Stony Brook, and as a result, could not keep his position in the GSO.
It was then that Gersch was appointed President, since he was Vice-President at the time.
Although both Soule and Gersch had to end their terms prematurely, both felt that they accomplished a lot in their time.
Soule said that they were successful in “professionalizing the GSO administration” and as a result, GSO became a more “respected organization”. He said that the members worked hard together to implement new programs and streamline GSO’s activities; a feat he is proud of.
Currently, Gersch said, there are a few candidates who are up for the position of President. He also said that he’s confident that a good President will be chosen. He added that he hopes the currently vacant position of Vice-President will be filled from this set of candidates as well.
