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Meet UVA’s 2023 student leaders

Honor Committee Chair
Gabrielle Bray (Col ’23)

Gabrielle Bray

After UVA students voted in March to replace Honor’s single-sanction expulsion penalty with a two-semester suspension, Bray, a history major from Memphis, Tennessee, was busy working on bylaw updates to address the change. Going forward, she says, there’s more to be done to educate UVA’s community about the role of Honor and to listen to concerns, including that the system is unfair or not trustworthy. She would like to see a constitutional referendum for a multisanctioned system “that can restore some rigor back to Honor and also address the concerns,” she says.


Judiciary Committee Chair
Nabeel Raza (Col ’23)

Nabeel Raza

As COVID-19 rates surged last year, so did Judiciary Committee cases around UVA’s public health rules—along with awareness about what the committee does. Raza, a human biology major from Roanoke, Virginia, hopes to capitalize on that. “Trying to take that energy and awareness and transition it back to our meat and potatoes will be interesting and also a good opportunity,” he says. His plans include educating students about the committee, providing more transparency about its inner workings and looking for biases in its practices.


Student Council President
Ceci Cain (Col ’22, Batten ’23)

Ceci Cain

Cain’s focus is to organize and advocate for the diverse needs of students. Her agenda includes securing scholarships for descendants of enslaved laborers, working to remove police from mental health crises and raising a $5 million endowment for student services. The descendant of enslaved Virginians and a low-income student, Cain, from Niskayuna, New York, said her goal is to build the kind of institution that addresses the needs of students like her. “We know that we are only going to get more diverse in terms of race and socioeconomic status,” says Cain, who is pursuing a government major and a master’s in public policy from the Batten School. “[It’s] making sure that those students have what they need to succeed and thrive here.”


Co-chair of Resident Staff Program
Holly Sims (Col ’23, Batten ’24)

Holly Sims

As a first-year, Sims, who is pursuing an undergraduate degree in environmental science and a master’s in public policy from the Batten School, saw how much fun resident advisers were having. So the Tallahassee, Florida, native joined the staff her second year and has thrived in the fun and collaborative environment. Sims plans to work toward a model of housing that makes room for nonbinary and transgender students and RAs. “I certainly would want to see gender-inclusive housing in any facility that gets built for upperclassmen and first-years,” Sims says.


Co-chair of Resident Staff Program
Karissa Ng (Col ’23)

Karissa Ng

Ng’s first-year resident adviser played an outsized role in her growth. “She taught me a lot about the process of overcoming various obstacles in life,” says the biology and anthropology double major from Virginia Beach. Ng became an RA because she wanted to give back. As co-chair, Ng’s focus is on the well-being of resident life staff so they don’t get burned out. “Because, ultimately,” she says, “the attitudes and mindsets that the resident staff brings, that trickles down and affects the living experience of the residents.”


Cavalier Daily Editor-in-Chief
Eva Surovell (Col ’23)

Eva Surovell

The COVID-19 pandemic and the changing news consumption habits of readers are prompting the Cavalier Daily to continue its move from print to digital. Surovell, an English and French major from Alexandria, Virginia, plans to lay the groundwork for the newspaper to transition to a fully digital operation. “Newsletters are one avenue that we have not really capitalized on that could bring in so much revenue and also get our news to the people it would best serve better,” Surovell says.


Board of Visitors Student Member
Lily Roberts (Arch ’23)

Lily Roberts

Amid the BOV’s work to build housing for second-years and other projects, Roberts is eager to bring her perspective as an urban and environmental planning major and dance, design and architectural history minor to the Board. She has also worked as an RA. “The 2030 plan is aligned with a lot of the things I’m interested in in terms of housing, public space and space creation at the University,” says Roberts of Williamsburg, Virginia, who will be the first student BOV member from the Architecture School.