Our Mission

The Council of Graduate Students is the authorized student government on campus representing all graduate/professional students at Michigan State University. Our mission is to promote the academic, social and economic goals of graduate and professional students.

COGS accomplishes its mission through advocacy, innovative programming, and collaboration with other student organizations and the academic and administrative units of the University.

Have a question for any of the Eboard members? Please email them at: office@cogs.msu.edu 

Our EBoard

Miles Roberts

Miles Roberts

he/him/his - President

Miles is a fourth year PhD student in the Genetics and Genome Sciences program. His research focuses on the population genetics of plants and the evolution of gene expression. Before becoming President, Miles represented the Genomics program at COGS meetings for a year and served as the COGS Treasurer for two years. He hopes to eventually have a career working in biotechnology.

Noah Lubben

Noah Lubben

he/him/his - Vice President of Internal Affairs

Noah is an MD-PhD Student within the College of Human Medicine. He earned his BS at Michigan State University. His research investigates proteinopathies and preclinical drug discovery in neurodegenerative diseases.

Priyanka Kothari

Priyanka Kothari

she/her/hers - Vice President of External Affairs

Priyanka is a second year Ph.D. student in the Curriculum, Instruction and Teacher Education program. Her research focuses on why we teach what we teach, with an emphasis on the history and politics of education. She is specifically interested in how ideas of nationalism and national identity are communicated through the social studies curriculum. Before becoming the VPEA, Priyanka served as the COGS Representative for her department for a year.

Nic Heilman

Nic Heilman

he/him/his - Treasurer

Nic is a PhD student in the dept. of Computational Mathematics, Science, and Engineering, and works on computational methods for fluid-structure interactions related to soft body deformations. Additionally, Nic has served as both the COGS representative and president of the graduate student organization for my respective department for one year.

Saviour Kitcher

Saviour Kitcher

he/him/his - Secretary

Saviour Kitcher is a doctoral student in Curriculum, Instruction, and Teacher Education (CITE). He graduated from the University of Ghana. His research interest focuses on PjBL in social studies, Curriculum Development and Evaluation, Soccer as a means of civic engagement, Active participation, and citizenship.

Parliamentarian

Parliamentarian

Vanessa Cardino

Vanessa Cardino

she/her/hers - Director of Event Planning

Vanessa Cardino is a fifth-year Human Nutrition Ph.D. candidate and Epidemiology Certificate student. Her research focuses on the relationships between dietary fatty acids, cognitive outcomes, and perinatal HIV status in children in low-middle-income countries. Vanessa also serves as the President Elect for the Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition’s Graduate Student Association.

Rachael Pyram

Rachael Pyram

she/her/hers - Director of Equity and Anti-Discrimination (DoEA)

Rachael is a Doctoral student in Organizational Psychology. She graduated from the University of South Florida with a dual-bachelors degree in Statistics and Psychology. She studies organizational social network dynamics within the context of workplace diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) issues, but notably her research has focused on allyship..

Sebastian Loonen

Sebastian Loonen

he/him/his - Medical Schools Liaison

Sebastian is a 2nd year MD candidate at the College of Human Medicine. Sebastian is involved in various organizations along with COGS hoping to address health inequities such as the Emergency Medicine Interest Group, Scrubs Addressing the Firearm Epidemic, and Spartan Street Medicine.

Duncan Bjerke

Duncan Bjerke

he/him/his - Law Liaison

Duncan is a second year Juris Doctorate Candidate at the College of Law. His areas of interest are civil and criminal litigation, copyright law, and estate planning. Duncan also serves as the External Affairs Chairman for the College of Law Student Bar Association and aspires to work in litigation post-graduation.

Dr. Matt Wawrzynski

Dr. Matt Wawrzynski

Faculty Advisor to COGS

Matthew Wawrzynski, Ph.D., is professor of higher, adult, and lifelong education. His research integrates non-cognitive measures and the collegiate environment with college student outcomes.

Our Staff

Deanne Arking

Deanne Arking

she/her/hers - Business Office Manager
James Peetz

James Peetz

Major: Advertising Creative

Contact Us

Chittenden Hall

466 W Circle Dr, room 120

office@cogs.msu.edu

517-353-9189