AMHERST — The first in a series of anonymous racist emails was sent to Black students and organizations at UMass Amherst in September 2021.

Tess Weisman, a current sophomore recently elected as next year’s president of the Student Government Association (SGA), was a first-semester freshman still finding her voice. Born in Ethiopia, Weisman was adopted at 2 years old. She lived in Greenfield until age 4, and then her family moved to Northampton where she has lived ever since.

“I was shocked because I obviously knew all about racism, but I was kind of sheltered in Northampton,” said Weisman, a Black woman, about the racist emails. “It’s such a loving community that I was never exposed to anything like that.”

Before coming to UMass, Weisman attended Northampton High School where she was active in sports, mainly with the ultimate flying disc team, but wasn’t involved in much else until attending UMass.

“I think that’s the thing, I really wasn’t a part of any clubs outside of sports,” Weisman said. “Coming to UMass, I had this huge thought shift … I was like, ‘Wow, I really like being a part of something bigger.’”

Growing up in Northampton, a predominantly white town, Weisman wasn’t exposed to much Black culture before coming to UMass, which she said “was a welcome adjustment … There were so many people that look like me, and I could actually find advisers and mentors that related to me as a Black woman.”

The racist email wasn’t sent to Weisman, but knowing that other Black students and organizations were the target of such hate inspired her to take action, especially since she felt students weren’t receiving answers from the UMass administration. She found out about SGA online and decided to apply to be the next secretary of university policy.

“I thought it was such a great opportunity to be a part of something bigger and really leave my mark at UMass and make a change… I wanted to be a student voice and make sure that student voices are being heard,” Weisman said.

When she first joined, she thought there was a disconnect between SGA and students, so her first goal was to reconnect her position with student agencies funded by SGA, including the University Programming Council, Center for Student Businesses, the Massachusetts Daily Collegian and 10 other student agencies.

She also focused her attention on the Wellman Document, which essentially ensures that student government bodies have a voice in administrative policy decisions that impact student life.

“I think that in the past SGA has been forgetting about that, forgetting how powerful we are and how much good we can do,” Weisman said.

Using the Wellman Document, Weisman worked with administration to pass an updated academic calendar in which classes will not be held on Election Day, starting in the 2024-25 school year and set for the following six years.

“We’re really here to make sure that students’ voices and opinions and dreams for the school are being put to fruition,” she said. “So, making sure that administration kind of meets a middle ground.”

One instance of meeting a middle ground had to do with diversity general education requirements (GenEds). Recognizing that administrators couldn’t reasonably add a whole new GenEd course about restorative or racial justice, SGA reached a compromise where certain components within the existing diversity GenEd were changed “to ensure that classrooms are taught in a safe space so that students of color, and non-students of color, feel like they can voice their opinion,” said Weisman.

Next year, as SGA president, Weisman plans to expand SGA’s outreach so that students are more aware of the impact SGA has on administrative decisions for student life. She and her vice president, Joshua Gauthier, plan to offer students rides to classes in golf carts, host “Cookies and Conversations” sessions, and open the SGA office space to students.

“Our goal is to bring SGA down to basics and put students first … Making sure that they’re being represented in every aspect whether that’s a sense of belonging, whether it’s in the academic classroom, sports … and making sure students feel like they can come to us,” Weisman said.

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