The newly elected student trustee does not want to be defined by his heritage, personal opinions, or popularity.

Instead, he seeks to speak for the underrepresented part-time and evening students who slave away at minimum wage jobs just to pursue an education.

This is probably because several years ago, he was one of them.

“My most important goal right now is to figure out a system or a mechanism where we can get an opinion from the students and have the accurate representation to deal with these issues,” said student trustee-elect Alfonso Palencia. “The Student Senate tends to represent, if you look around the table, traditional, full-time students. We don’t have the information telling us how a portion of the student body feels.”

Palencia is a global studies major at City College. Not only is he currently student advocate on campus, but he also represents our region, Region IV, at the statewide Student Senate for California Community Colleges.

He will run for regional senator in June, which would mean a trip up to Sacramento almost every month to meet with other senators.

In the years leading up to his enrollment at City College last spring, Palencia worked as a real estate agent and immigration paralegal.

Immigration paralegals work with attorneys to draft documents, conduct research and prepare for trials involving citizenship, immigration and naturalization matters.

“I have a lot of experience dealing with contracts, legal documents, solving problems, and finding creative solutions to multifaceted issues,” said Palencia. “As a real estate agent and as a paralegal you have to coordinate with a lot of different agencies and organizations.”

Palencia’s parents immigrated from Mexico and Guatemala. After dropping out at Pasadena High School, he enrolled at Pasadena City College. But too many years of struggling to find classes that fit his schedule led Palencia to leave in search of something better suited to his needs.

“[At Pasadena City College] I wanted to become more involved, do more of the things I never did because I was an part-time, evening student. I was working full-time and they said, ‘Maybe you’re not the right fit, go look somewhere else,” Palencia said.

His brother had just graduated from UCSB, which inspired Palencia to check out City College in hopes of transferring.

“I came up here and started talking to the administration and the faculty,” Palencia said. He snapped his fingers. “It was just like that. Immediately you could just feel the fit. This was the campus that had that warmth, that community.”

Upon finding out the student advocate position was open, Palencia jumped on the opportunity.

“I found out what I needed to do to run, and then from there it just took off,” Palencia said.

Since then his attention has narrowed and focused on the 33 percent of evening students and 57 percent of part-time students attending City College with no means for representation.

He has begun working on providing a different perspective for Das Williams to consider in the crafting of one of his bills, Assembly Bill 955. The bill would allow community colleges to offer non-state-funded extension courses during intersession.

This could have a two-tiered system effect on our school if not handled properly.

“As a representative you represent your constituents, so my opinions and the way I think or feel should not matter,” Palencia said. “We need student opinions. We need to know what they think, how they feel.”

With only 863 out of more than 20,000 students voting, one would assume statistics are at a startling low, but this year’s candidates brought in 271 more votes than in 2012.

Palencia hopes to bring more awareness to the student body about who’s making decisions on campus.

“I believe he is an excellent fit,” said Dean Marilynn Spaventa. “He is mature, knowledgeable about the campus and very articulate.  He has the confidence to participate as well as represent.”

The Student Senate recently received some criticism for not reaching out to the student body more passionately. As a part of the delegation, Palencia has some criticisms of his own, including the lack of a dress code.

“When do you ever find an organization or a body of individuals not in need of improvement?” asked Palencia. “There are issues that need to be addressed. The senators are definitely on notice, so there is a buzz about changing things.”