Though she’s only moving to the west side of the Iowa River, Allisa Pandit, the outgoing president of the University of Iowa’s Tippie Senate, feels a great deal of sentimentality leaving the university’s business college behind.

Pandit served as Tippie Senate president for the 2025-26 academic year, her final year at the UI. The spring semester marked her last as an undergraduate, as she plans to enter the UI’s law program in
the fall.

Pandit has been involved with Tippie Senate since her first year, immediately developing an interest in the organization from her student leadership roles, such as student council in high school.

The UI’s Tippie Senate is the undergraduate student government for the Tippie College of Business, serving to represent Tippie students and advocate for their needs while managing funds for
student organizations.

“Every single year, Tippie Senate has been my number one priority,” she said. “Traditionally, seniors don’t like to run for leadership positions, but Tippie Senate is something that I love to do, and it feels like I love to do it in my free time. So, it never felt like I was overexerting myself.”

Pandit said through the help of her executive board and the other senators, Tippie Senate has strengthened its emphasis on student leadership and experimental learning during her time as president.

Pandit pointed to the senate’s case competitions, learning events where students work in teams to analyze real business problems and present solutions to judges, as emblematic of the senate’s strengthened student leadership and experimental learning.

Tippie hosted its first National Case Competition in October 2025 under Pandit’s administration, where schools from across the country came to compete for a weekend. Pandit said the event was a success.

Paige Reynolds, Tippie Senate’s senior vice president, was impressed to see Pandit in action during the case competition.

“She ended up volunteering from 6 a.m. to basically 10 p.m.,” she said. “It was on Halloween weekend, and she was working almost 12-hour days for it, which is just
so impressive.”

Reynolds said Pandit excelled at leading Tippie Senate with a
quiet grace.

“She lets everybody else have their own opinions, which is really nice,” she said. “I’ve had a lot of different leaders where you feel like you can’t disagree with them or like they’ll just say their opinion first. I think she is really great at getting other people’s feedback with different issues.”

The senate launched a presidential summit on May 4 at the Hilton Garden Inn, celebrating Pandit and other Tippie student organization leaders.

Pandit helped launch the first presidential summit at the end of her third year, after she finished studying abroad. The event sparked her interest in running for president in her senior year.

“The presidential summit has truly been a great opportunity to celebrate Tippie leadership and student leadership in general, which I feel like is the number one reason I was drawn to Tippie Senate in the first place,” she said. “So it’s really full circle for me.”

Pandit said she is most proud of making Tippie Senate a more visible presence on campus during her time in the organization.

“It’s been amazing to see our progression throughout my college career,” she said. “As a freshman, people would be like, ‘What’s Tippie Senate?’ versus now, I hear people saying, ‘Are you going to that Tippie Senate event?’ Seeing that progression has been amazing.”

Pandit said she faces several new unknowns in law school, but her desire to take on leadership roles will remain unchanged.

Second-year student at the UI and incoming president, Vismitha Vuppala, said Pandit was excellent in being a communicative leader.

One of Vuppala’s favorite changes under Pandit’s presidency was her moving committee work into regular Senate meetings, allowing updates and task assignments to occur during scheduled time instead of requiring separate meetings, saving members additional time.

“Her impact on me has just been very profound,” Vuppala said. “She really showed me what great leadership looks like in executive meetings and also general meetings.”

Vuppala said she hopes to continue Pandit’s ability to voice the entire student body’s opinion without inserting her own opinions.

“She’s very well aware of the entirety of the Senate’s opinions and the student body’s opinions, and she really communicates that to staff and faculty, which is something that I want to carry on,” she said.