The ISA Board would like to submit its annual report to the Councils. This report shall highlight
the work done by the Board and Council together for the year 2020/2021. ISA is built from the
ground up with no external assistance. The ISA received not a single dollar external funding by
University, SU or the GSA. The ISA this time is fully made by the international students
themself.
Internal Strength:
The International Students’Association (ISA) restarted its operations in Jan 2020, with just four
students but we are proud to announce that the ISA has grown tremendously over this past year,
as of today the ISA has 65+ directors and coordinators, 25 sub coordinators, 40 council and
board members. Thus 130+ internal members. The ISA is officially the largest student
association on all five campuses at the UofA.
Governance and structure:
This year was a hard one as we were making an association unlike any other on this campus, the
ISA had unique challenges to accommodate the graduate and undergraduate students in the ISA.
No campus association has this but we as ISA stayed firm to our values of building an ISA that is
for every international student on all five University of Alberta campuses. The ISA decided to
have a very innovative structure, we have two councils, and the Board of the governance and
administration of ISA and seven departments for the execution. This infrastructure was new but
has worked quite well to serve the international students community. The ISA Constitution and
the Bylaws were enacted officially in Sep making a total of 60+ pages and ISA also implemented
an operations policy of 30+ pages this year. Thus giving ISA a strong structure to operate and
serve the community.
Relations:
We can proudly say that the entire University knows about ISA, we have made relations in
various University departments, faculties and central administration. The ISA is a student
representative association (SRA) for the Students’ Union and a key stakeholder for the Graduate
Students’Association (GSA). The ISA has built relationships with 12+ international students
advocating bodies around Canada. ISA also established a direct line of communication between
the ISA and the Ministry of Advanced Education. All these connections have enabled the ISA
President to have direct communication with the Minister, University President, Provost or any
Vice President. We have also established relationships with the news agencies, especially the
Gateway, CBC and Edmonton Journal. Thus effectively enabling the ISA to reach out and make
students' voices heard. Our Presence in the GFC has enabled the entire university administration body to know about the ISA and its influence at the UofA. ISA now sits on the Council on
Student Affairs and various other committees on Campus. ISA is also strongly involved in the
regional associations and an evidence is the open letter being signed by 9 regional associations
on ISAs request, we have also established strong relationships with Faculty Associations on the
campus.
Advocacy:
The ISA advocated for many things and few of the achievements are residence students being
provided free relocation assistance at the beginning of pandemic, inclusion of the international
students into the UPass supplementary Ride Transit Program. ISA also became a Student
Representative Association. We have been and are actively involved in resolving the online
learning issues, ISA forced the university to make a task force, we made the GFC to make time
zones an accomodation ground. We have made this institution realize the hardships of the
international students from time to time and our presence now ensures that when anything
impacts international students the University, SU, GSA and Ministry know that there exist a
strong and vocal ISA to defend the international students interests. The community knows very
well our power and outreach in terms of being the largest association on this campus.
Proudly we can say that all above mentioned achievements were possible due to an active
collaboration between the ISA Board, Councils and the Departments. We have made great strides
this year and this great work shall continue under the upcoming leadership of the ISA.
ISA Board Members:
Chanpreet Singh - President
Arwa Amer - Undergraduate Chancellor
Sudhanshu Tyagi - Graduate Chancellor
Abigail Ameley Quaye, ChuanyaoZhong, and Ricardo Andrade Rossi - Vice President Academic
Sezvo-ndinemwi and Mahek Seth - Vice President Communication
Gurbani Baweja - Vice President External
William Bbossa and Daniel Alejandro Vice President - Finance-CO
Vanessa Elongo - Vice President Graduate Affairs
Doga Canturk and Salsabila Natasha - Vice President Internal
Safwan - Vice President Student Life
Anshita Student - Governance Officer
Jugal Sadhnani - Manager
Graduate Council:
Avash Puri
Fernanda Talarico
Klevis Haxhiaj
Dagem Haddis
Shaista Meghani
Braulio Alejandro Marfil-Garza
Anas Fassih
Undergraduate Council:
Penny Wei Qi Neoh
Bima Ariyanto
Akanksha Yeola
Raiya Hassan
Madina Usserbayeva
Sterling Kwaku Dua
Muhammad Rafay
Namrata Niteen Sarkhot
Yintong "Lionel" Liu
Mobashhir Khan
Tanyaradzwa Gozhora
Vishal Vekaria
Adnan Nadeer
Aarman Mitha
Dhir Bid
Eunah Cha
Jumpei Kawano
Qianxi Li
Robel Ng'ong'a
Imane Elmellouki