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Leadership · Graduate Students’ Association

Leadership

2024–2025

President

University of Alberta · Graduate Students’ Association

One year leading the association representing graduate students at the University of Alberta, on a work plan built around four themes: grow, engage, advocate and reimagine.

$8.55M
in graduate student financial support secured over the term
$3.4M
returned to students through the renewed U-Pass agreement
$400K
saved over three years by a re-engineered health & dental plan
$200K
channelled into a new Community Engagement Award for course-based master’s students, with $400K committed after

Every figure is drawn from the 2024–2025 Strategic Work Plan Final Report. Wider coverage sits in the association’s news and releases.

Funding and affordability5
Health, wellness and services5
Provincial and federal advocacy7
Muhammad Haseeb Arshad speaking on a panel at the AI-CADEMY Canada Summit for Post-Secondary Education, seated with four other panellists.
Student panellist on AI policy, AI-CADEMY Canada Summit for Post-Secondary Education
Governance4
2023–2024

Vice President Student Services

University of Alberta · Graduate Students’ Association

The year before the presidency, on the student services portfolio. Mental health, food security, student-parents, and the data that made the case for all three.

Data and advocacy3
Mental health and wellbeing3
Food security3
Student-parents and campus access5

Appointments

Governance seats
  • 2024–2025

    Governor, Board of Governors

    University of Alberta

    The GSA’s seat on the university’s highest governing body, which is where the budget decisions actually get made. The result I am proudest of from that year is no tuition increase for international graduate research students, with the university’s financial support kept in place rather than traded off against it.

  • 2024–2025

    Primary Delegate

    Canadian Alliance of Student Associations, Ottawa

    Represented the University of Alberta GSA at CASA. That year CASA carried a dedicated graduate student ask for the first time, covering two things. Indexing Tri-Council grants to inflation, and revising the Section D comprehensive points for international students studying in Canada.

  • 2024–2025

    Member, Federal Policy Committee

    Canadian Alliance of Student Associations, Ottawa

    Lead author on the AI policy paper CASA published that year, setting out how generative AI should be used in Canadian post-secondary education.

    Digital Transformation: Integrating AI in Canadian Post-Secondary Education →
  • 2024–2025

    Member, Graduate Advocacy Committee

    Canadian Alliance of Student Associations, Ottawa

    Helped start the first graduate-student-led Graduate Forum, so graduate delegates had somewhere to present their own research rather than only lobby about it.

  • 2023–2024

    Board Member

    Campus Food Bank, Edmonton

    Finalised the Executive Director’s new contract, rebuilt the financial accounting so the organisation met both Edmonton Food Bank requirements and provincial legislation, and helped the Food Bank run and win its first referendum with the Graduate Students’ Association.

Before Edmonton

  • 2020–2021

    Secretary, Pakistan Corner

    KFUPM, Dhahran

  • since 2014

    Student Member, Pakistan Engineering Council

    Lahore