It’s a new semester at Point Park, and for the Student Government Association (SGA), that means many things: a new funding period, new events to plan and this particular year, it means that it’s sophomore global cultural studies major Grace Tyler Frank-Rempel’s first semester as Vice President of SGA.

This position change over break came as somewhat of a shock to Frank-Rempel, as she was not elected into the position. She succeeded Alexa Lake as Vice President once Lake revealed at the last SGA meeting of 2019 that she would not be returning to the university. Frank-Rempel knew that possibly being Vice President was part of the job, but it was never something she thought would actually happen.

“No. I mean, it was in the back of my head thinking like ‘It’s part of the job. If something happens, I will step in,’ and I was prepared for that as much as I could be, but I wasn’t expecting to have to do it,” Vice President Frank-Rempel said.

With that being said, Frank Rempel is no stranger to SGA, formerly USG. She joined when she was in her first semester as a freshman senator. She joined the rules committee so she could change the constitution, which she described as “a mess.” Over the last semester, she was President Pro-Tempore, where her job was to keep track of office hours, dress code and be next in line for the Vice President. Between these two jobs, Frank-Rempel admits that being Vice President daunts her more than being President Pro-Tempore.

“They are very different jobs. It’s a lot more time, which is fine, but the duties of it are very different and I don’t quite understand them yet,” Frank-Rempel said. She notes that both jobs are very different, so it will take some getting used to for her new duties.

“My job was to work within our group of people to better us,” she said. “Not how I would affect the entire student body.”

Frank-Rempel also faces a challenge in that her predecessor had an entire summer to study and prepare, and she only had winter break to prepare for the duties of Vice President.

Speaking of Alexa Lake, Frank-Rempel admitted that Lake had been very useful in the transition process from President Pro-Tempore to Vice President.

“We have had meetings about it, yeah, and she is still in my back pocket and I still call her about any questions that I have,” Frank-Rempel said. She also noted that she is in a similar boat, helping new President Pro-Tempore Bryce Hayzlett with his transition.

In the coming semester, she hopes to see the legislative body work together and hopes the upcoming season offers the chance for her to work with new faces as well.

“What I wanted as Pro-Tempore this semester is for us to work as a cohesive unit. Which is still what I want as Vice President. I don’t have as much ability to feed into that anymore, but I think it’s an opportunity for me to connect with club leaders and the administration more as well,” she said. For other students, Frank-Rempel sees the upcoming semester as a chance for teamwork.

“I think this semester is a fresh start for us and it’s an opportunity for people to understand each other and to set expectations for each other,” she said.

Frank-Rempel closed out the interview with some thoughtful words about the purpose of SGA.

“That’s what we’re here to do: Make an impact on people and change things in a way that our student body wants to be changed and in a way to better our school,” she said.