House Government and Officers

Ashdown residents play a key role in dorm operations and management. The main people responsible for running the dorm are the Ashdown House Executive Committee (AHEC) and the many Ashdown officers. The election procedures for AHEC are described in the Ashdown House Constitution.

Officers: information on reimbursement procedures can be found here.

Ashdown House Executive Committee (AHEC)

AHEC consists of five residents and is elected annually in the Spring. The five positions are Chair, Treasurer, Operations Officer, Officer Coordinator and Secretary. The AHEC Chair presides over the weekly AHEC meetings and acts as the primary liaison to the MIT administration and other student groups. The Treasurer keeps track of the available funds, writes proposals for outside funding sources, and coordinates reimbursements for purchases made by Ashdown officers. The Operations Officer is responsible for running all in-house room lotteries. The Officer Coordinator maintains a list of current Ashdown officers and assigns seniority points accordingly. Finally, the Secretary is primarily responsible for taking minutes at AHEC meetings.

AHEC meets every Thursday evening in the Crafts Lounge to discuss dorm-related issues. These meetings are open to the entire Ashdown community. All residents are encouraged to attend, whether they have something to contribute or simply want to listen. Residents are also free to bring up problems or concerns at AHEC meetings. If you have something to add to the agenda, please email ahec (at) mit.edu.

The current AHEC members are:

Andrea Dubin Chair	Rong Yuan Officer Coordinator	Evelina Polyzoeva Operations Officer	Andrew Wright Secretary	Ashley Morishige Treasurer

Ashdown Officers

Everything Ashdown does, from caring for fish to planning dance parties to keeping the pianos in tune, is powered by our officers — residents who have volunteered their time to help out the dorm. Even though the positions have varied responsibilities, all of them are important in keeping the building running smoothly.

For their hard work, officers are rewarded with up to 3 seniority points per term. This gives them a huge advantage in our in-house lottery.

A current listing of officer positions is given below. Please contact ahec@mit.edu if any of these jobs sound appealing to you, or if you just want to help make Ashdown a better place. Additionally, feel free to suggest new officer positions that are more aligned with your interests.

Alumni and Orientation Committee

Morgan Dwyer	Chen Song	Jeremy Bigness	Flavio Calmon	Xin Zhao
Rong Yang

The Alumni and Orientation Officers work over the summer to plan an exciting and welcoming orientation with a number of Ashdown-related events for new students in late August and early September. They also plan events for returning Ashdown House alumni, publish an alumni newsletter, and assist the housemasters in keeping in contact with alumni.
ashdown-alumni (at) mit.edu

Art Officer

Amanda Wachtel

Vivian Chaya Hecht

The Art Officer is responsible for putting up and maintaining artwork around the dorm, as well as initiating art-related programs within the dorm such as crafts groups and workshops.
ashdown-art (at) mit.edu

Athletics Officer

Baldin A Llorens-Bonilla

Kyu Seob Kim

The Athletics Officer is responsible for organizing and overseeing all athletics-related issues in Ashdown, as well as being a liaison for other athletics-related events on campus. Tasks include coordinating Ashdown intramural sports teams and ensuring all the athletics equipment in the dorm is in working order.
ashdown-athletics (at) mit.edu

Brunch Committee

Jane Chui	Xiaochuan (Ben) Yang	Zhe Zhu	Ludwig Schmidt	Wei Yu
Ali Kazerani	Yu Xin	Yuran Wang	Zhaohong Han	Rong Yuan

The Brunch Committee is responsible for organizing brunches on Sunday mornings in the Hulsizer Room on a monthly basis. It is quite an adventure to prepare food on an industrial scale by cutting fruit, setting out baked goods, and cooking on the large griddle.
ashdown-brunch (at) mit.edu

Coffee Hour Committee

Cole Shaw	Nina Lee	Kevin Kung	Jingsi Xu	Sarah Thornton
Hsin-Jung Yang	Xu Zhang	Sha Miao	Jee Yeon Hwang

The Coffee Hour Committee is responsible for organizing Ashdown's weekly coffee hour every Thursday night at 9 pm in the Hulsizer Room. This long-standing tradition provides residents with a great setting to relax and socialize while enjoying snacks and coffee.
ashdown-coffee (at) mit.edu

Community Service Officer

Allison K O\'Hair

He Wang

The Community Service Officer is responsible for raising awareness and planning community service events for Ashdown House residents.
ashdown-community (at) mit.edu

Cultural Committee

Matthew Carey	Shabnam Raayai Ardakani	Christin Sander	Fahri Erinc Hizir	Chidube D Ezeozue
Ali Kazerani	Xiaodan Jia	Huaiyu Meng	Bruno Verdini Trejo	Karan Mehta
Madalyn Berns

The Cultural Committee is responsible for organizing and publicizing cultural events such as dinners, recitals, films, concerts, plays, ballets, and other culturally-themed activities in Ashdown, MIT, and the greater Boston area.
ashdown-cultural (at) mit.edu

Environmental Officer

He Wang

Zahraa Saiyed

The Environment Officer is responsible for raising awareness about environmental issues in Ashdown and promoting recycling, composting, and energy conservation. The NW35 building was built to a LEED Gold standard and residents can do even more to help the environment.
ashdown-environmental (at) mit.edu

Floor 1 Officer

Abishek Bajpayee

Edbert-Jarvis Sie

Floor Officers serve as a residential assistants and voice fellow residents' concerns and interests to AHEC. They are responsible for encouraging interaction among residents and organizing floor events, as well as overseeing the floor common areas and the use of floor bulletin boards.
ashdown-1-officers (at) mit.edu

Floor 2 Officer

Richard Y Zhang

Laura Riegel

Floor 3 Officer

Wardah Inam

Cody Sumter

Floor 4 Officer

Li Yu

Jamie Cara Rosen

Floor 5 Officer

Thapana Chairoj

Abishek Bajpayee

GSC Representative

Andrea Dubin

Nicole Casasnovas

The GSC Representative attends monthly Graduate Student Concil meetings on behalf of Ashdown House and provides summaries to AHEC.
ashdown-gsc (at) mit.edu

Inventory Officer

Gwen Gettliffe

Frank Permenter

The Inventory Officer is responsible for maintaining inventory at the front desk, as well as buying new movies, board games, video games, tools, and home appliances for Ashdown House.
ashdown-inventory (at) mit.edu

Kitchen Officer

Arghavan Safavi-Naini

Misha Sra

The Kitchen Officer is responsible for overseeing the cleanliness of the Hulziser kitchen. Other responsibilities include serving as a liaison between the various committees that use the kitchen and carrying out a kitchen inspection after major events to make sure that it is cleaned properly.
ashdown-kitchen (at) mit.edu

Living Things Committee

Carl Schoellhammer

Helen Feng

Cecilia Viggiano

The Living Things Committee is responsible for maintaining the lobby fish tank and all house-owned plants located in the common areas. Aside from its residents, Ashdown has many living things that make the dorm a nicer place to live.
ashdown-living (at) mit.edu

Newsletter Officer

Sakul Ratanalert

Anne-Raphaelle Aubry

The Newsletter Officer is responsible for editing, printing, and distributing the monthly Ashdown newsletter “3am.”
ashdown-newsletter (at) mit.edu

Outing Committee

Kuang Xu

Katherine Bouman

The Outing Committee is responsible for organizing outdoor-themed activities and trips for Ashdown residents year round. Events may include picnics, hiking, kayaking, city tours, and theater or musical performances.
ashdown-outing (at) mit.edu

Photographer and History Officer

Aarthy Adityan Kanaan

Ganeshapillai Gartheeban

The Photographer and History Officer is responsible for documenting life at Ashdown House. Other responsibilities include taking photographs at major events and updating the existing house historical records.
ashdown-photo (at) mit.edu

Publicity Committee

Jason Boggess

Erioseto Hendranata

The Publicity Committee is responsible for collecting information about Ashdown, MIT, and off-campus events and publicizing them. Other responsibilities include sending out a weekly email to residents about events and organizing publicity campaigns for Ashdown events (creating posters, printing them, and putting them up around campus).
ashdown-publicity (at) mit.edu

Social Committee

Lili Yu	Ronald Wilcox	Richard Y Zhang	Leslie Maldonado	Daniel Montana
Daniel Soltero	Forrest Meyen	Andre Calmon	Gokhan Dundar	Wardah Inam
Benyue (Emma) Liu	Kevin Kung

The Social Committee is responsible for organizing house-sponsored social activities such as parties, barbeques, beach trips, and movie/dinner outings. These events can be open to Ashdown residents only or to the entire MIT community.
ashdown-social (at) mit.edu

Technology Committee

Itai Stein

David Wilson

Zhandos Y. Orazalin

The Technology Committee is responsible for maintaining and improving the Ashdown website and the computing facilities at the dorm. They should help with the hallway displays throughout the building as well as other AV systems in the common areas. The Technology Committee also keeps track of how residents use Ashdown's two printers (avery and ashdown) by enforcing the 100-page-per-resident printing limit and stocking both printers with paper and toner.
ashdown-tech (at) mit.edu

TEEC Representative

Arghavan Safavi-Naini

Andrew Wright

The Thirsty Ear is a student-run pub found within Ashdown's common space. Given that the Thirsty Ear Executive Committee (TEEC) is separate from Ashdown's house government, the TEEC Representative serves as a liaison between the Thirsty Ear and Ashdown House. This person must attend TEEC meetings to voice out residents’ concerns and look after the dorm’s interests.
ashdown-teec (at) mit.edu

Wellness and Safety Officer

Alex Guo

ashdown-wellness (at) mit.edu