Freshman English major Samiya Mohamed-Fawzy resigned for her position as the Student Government Association at-large representative for West Village on Feb. 21, leaving the spot open.

Mohamed-Fawzy said her decision to resign came after dealing with a heavy homework load and an exchange of emails with SGA Chief Justice Zack Lanham.

She received a violation from SGA after not giving a 24-hour advance notice of her absence from the Feb. 21 general business meeting.

“I talked it out with the president and the secretary and I emailed her and the vice president, and the chief justice didn’t know any of that. He emailed me and basically told me that homework was not an excuse for missing a meeting and it was not acceptable,” Mohamed-Fawzy said. “So, I decided to resign.”

Lanham wrote in an email that he is sad to see Mohamed-Fawzy go and that she had potential to be a solid member of SGA.

“She mentioned she was resigning from WV Rep because she had too many commitments and zero time to do all of them,” Lanham wrote. “She sent me her resignation after I had to file a Minor violation against her in regards to skipping a meeting to do homework.”

Lanham wrote that he understands that balancing school work and extracurricular activities can be tough, but there is a procedure to follow in SGA which includes notifying someone with SGA 24 hours in advance.

“If a representative mismanaged their responsibilities and has to miss a meeting because of it, they will receive a minor violation,” Lanham wrote. “It is the rule. No one is above this.”

Mohamed-Fawzy wrote in an email that part of her issue with Lanham’s initial email was “that he included my verbal warning in the email, defeating the whole purpose of it being a verbal warning because it’s now on record.”

SGA President Alyssa Hutchinson said Lanham’s email was no different than any other email he would send to a SGA member for a violation. However, Mohamed-Fawzy responded to the email pointing out grammatical errors, “then picked at the fact that she had gotten the verbal warning on this day instead of this day and then went off.”

“Her verbal warning was about her attire. She was wearing jeans and we have business attire,” Hutchinson said. “Then she went off about there are girls that have low cut shirts.”

Hutchinson said her vacant position will be filled like any other SGA position, through interviews.

“Residence Life already has lot of representation with RAs and that kind of stuff, so honestly it is the easier position to live without if we have to,” Hutchinson said.

SGA elections will start at the end of March. Mandatory meetings for candidates will take place the week after spring break, with paperwork due April 5. Campaigning will take place the weeks of April 1 and April 8. Voting will be April 15-16.