Lambda Alliance elects new board

On Tuesday night, The Lambda Alliance, the umbrella organization for campus groups serving the LGBT community, elected a new board.

Wharton sophomore Dennie Zastrow, stepping up as chairperson, will use his term to push for policy changes at the University level and to further collaboration with the LGBT community both on campus and off.

As part of an ongoing initiative, Zastrow will continue the work started by past Lambda boards to reform admissions procedures in concordance with Penn's antidiscrimination policy. He hopes to pressure the administration to remove gender restrictions on applications that only allow prospective students to identify as male or female.

Zastrow also plans to encourage "coalition building" between Lambda Alliance and the LGBT community in greater Philadelphia. "As students, we often forget we're members of the Philadelphia community as well as the Penn community," he said.

Former vice chair of political affairs Cynthia Wright said she thinks Zastrow will prove a great addition to the board.

"Dennie is very passionate about what he's doing, and he's been working very hard to make changes here," she said.

Also elected Tuesday night was College freshman Alec Webley, who will replace the outgoing Wright. Webley, who introduced an amendment to the Lambda Alliance constitution prior to elections that allowed him to run as a freshman for a board position, will be responsible for promoting the goals of the Lambda Alliance in the greater Penn arena, including handling administrative policy.

Webley will work closely with the LGBT student groups to implement such changes. "Lambda is a prism that takes all the lights of its constituent groups and refracts them all together," he said. "We need to stand together."

Wright said she is looking forward to Webley's impassioned political presence on the Lambda Alliance board, especially in light of the difficulties she faced as vice chair of political affairs this past term. "We need to light the fire that hasn't been going in a long time," she said.

Another College freshman, Enmanuel Martinez, was elected to the board as the new vice chair of internal affairs. As such, he will coordinate the efforts of constituent groups and facilitate joint programming.

"Collaboration is key," Martinez said. "With collaboration you get communication, with communication you get awareness, and with awareness you get progress."

In the last vote of the night, Engineering sophomore Matt Feczko was elected as the new vice chair of communication.

The position of vice chair of finance and development remains unfilled and will be subject to appointment and confirmation by the rising Lambda Alliance board.

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