2008 Woodie Awards
Make your voices heard: Vote in the SGA elections
STAFF EDITORIAL
Issue date: 3/24/08 Section: Opinion
ATTENTION ALL STUDENTS: Regardless of who you support, please make your voice heard and vote in this year's SGA elections. The student body - and the University as a whole - has a lot riding on the elections this year. It is important that each and every student gives his or her input into selecting the leaders of our student body.
So what is at stake? Well, for starters, the existence of SGA could be. One presidential candidate Jeffrey Ryan Harris has made it his mission to abolish the SGA. Whether he is elected president or not, he hopes to collect enough signatures to force a university-wide initiative that will call for the dissolution of the SGA.
His main complaints seem to be that too much of our student money is wasted on SGA and the organizations that SGA supports through the appropriations process. He also complains that the appropriations process is unfair and that there is a built-in bias toward certain organizations.
But the thing is even if SGA is disbanded, students will not be refunded the portion of their fees that go to SGA. The administration may decide to redirect the fees to another source or simply create a non-student run body that handles the distribution of these fees to deserving organizations.
There may be problems with the current student-run appropriations process, but just think how much more bureaucratic and difficult it would be if this process was run by some administrative office - or worse yet, just think how much many deserving organizations would be hurt if this funding was redirected.
After all, SGA appropriations do not just fund T-shirts and social events, but it is also a major source of funding for conferences, invited speakers, and other academic and professional events.
The other two presidential candidates, current SGA Chief Justice Caitlin Collins and founder of Students Who Stand Mikey Hendrich, aren't proposing anything as radical as abolishing the SGA. Both have plenty of ideas worth considering.
Collins' campaign stresses campus security. She wants to work with the administration and student body to enact an efficient text-messaging-based warning system in case of an emergency. After all, what good is it to receive an e-mail letting you know that tornados have touched down nearby when the electricity has already been knocked out due to the sever weather? Plus, if there were any kind of campus shooting, students would receive the emergency information much quicker if the messages were sent directly to their phones rather than e-mail.
So what is at stake? Well, for starters, the existence of SGA could be. One presidential candidate Jeffrey Ryan Harris has made it his mission to abolish the SGA. Whether he is elected president or not, he hopes to collect enough signatures to force a university-wide initiative that will call for the dissolution of the SGA.
His main complaints seem to be that too much of our student money is wasted on SGA and the organizations that SGA supports through the appropriations process. He also complains that the appropriations process is unfair and that there is a built-in bias toward certain organizations.
But the thing is even if SGA is disbanded, students will not be refunded the portion of their fees that go to SGA. The administration may decide to redirect the fees to another source or simply create a non-student run body that handles the distribution of these fees to deserving organizations.
There may be problems with the current student-run appropriations process, but just think how much more bureaucratic and difficult it would be if this process was run by some administrative office - or worse yet, just think how much many deserving organizations would be hurt if this funding was redirected.
After all, SGA appropriations do not just fund T-shirts and social events, but it is also a major source of funding for conferences, invited speakers, and other academic and professional events.
The other two presidential candidates, current SGA Chief Justice Caitlin Collins and founder of Students Who Stand Mikey Hendrich, aren't proposing anything as radical as abolishing the SGA. Both have plenty of ideas worth considering.
Collins' campaign stresses campus security. She wants to work with the administration and student body to enact an efficient text-messaging-based warning system in case of an emergency. After all, what good is it to receive an e-mail letting you know that tornados have touched down nearby when the electricity has already been knocked out due to the sever weather? Plus, if there were any kind of campus shooting, students would receive the emergency information much quicker if the messages were sent directly to their phones rather than e-mail.
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