The SA President has less than nine months after election to complete their plans. If a presidential candidate has no vision at this point in the process, it will be increasingly difficult for them to get anything done next year. It is because this reasoning that I have drafted up my initiatives for my potential role as SA President next year. The plan is ready and for many of these ideas the ball is already rolling.
Petition Service For Students
A continuing problem on our University is the disconnect between students and administrators. This is something that many student body presidents have attempted to address in the past with varied amounts of success. We have lunches with Dr. Schubert, and programs that seek to find the next big idea on our campus. We have even tried surveys and polls in the past, but these fail to meet the immediate needs of students because of the time spent drafting the survey and breaking down the data. You see what if something needs to happen fast or the administration won’t change something until they can see then number of students who truly want it. The solution to this is a petition, where students submit an idea that they want to be petitioned on our campus. Examples from the past include the petition to bring back dead day or even the petition to get back the piano man back into the Bean. The idea is to have petitions idea submitted to the congress for approval. If the congress approves the petition then it will go up on the SA website and electronically sign the petition. If the petition reaches a certain number of students that is agreed on between the administration and the Students’ Association, then it is brought to the administrator that could best address the issue and the problem is assessed. This is proven to work in the past and only needs to be molded to fit ACU in order to fix the disconnect between students and administrators.
Online voting
We consider our university to be innovative yet we do not have a voting system that reaches all students with ease. I am working with a group of students right now to develop a program that should go out in the fall. The purpose with online voting is to reach the students where they are. This program could also be used for such elections as Homecoming Queen as well as Mr. and Ms. ACU. It will be interesting to see how the voter turn out is for this competitive election. Historically the turn out has been well below 20 percent and for me that is nowhere near high enough.
The Hiring of the Dean of Student
This position will drastically impact the future of students on our campus. I will push hard to make sure that the student voice is heard on who they want their next dean to be. This decision not only impacts this next year but also the 4-5 years after, depending on how long the position is held. This individual will be responsible for hiring the Associate Dean of Students, address the pressing need for improved Residence Halls, insuring a balanced budget in the office of student life, and merging the gap between the administration and students.
Increased communication with Dr. Schubert and his office
The transition from Dr. Money to Dr. Schubert has been an exciting trip, daily we are figuring out what the future will look like. It is my goal to make the relationship between Dr. Schubert, his executive team, and the students more fruitful. The relationship with the ACU President and SA President must be mutually beneficial and open. Students need to see him and he needs to hear students. I will encourage him and his team to be more involved on our campus. Students need to know who is running this University and who to go to if they have an issue. The role of the SA President is foster this growth, and to inform students about the decisions that are being made and to voice the opinion of the students.
