By Stephen Cook
With students on campus settling in to a new semester, the college’s Student Senate continues to assemble its group of senators.
Student Senate is made up of 30 elected students that work to involve students in various campus issues and problems students may be facing. Five executive board members and 25 senators at large comprise the group.
As of press time, 19 of the 25 senator positions are filled. Before their Sept. 23 general assembly meeting, 17 seats were filled.
Elliot Rogers, Student Senate president, said one of the biggest challenges that Student Senate faces is getting involvement and getting a representation of the whole student body.
“There’s no such thing as a captive audience [at the college],” Rogers said. “If they come here for classes they want to just leave; they don’t understand that we are a living part of this campus. They don’t understand the dynamics of it so they don’t want to be part of it.”
The response during the most recent senator-at-large election wasn’t the greatest, both in regards to people running and voting, according to Mindy Kinnaman, adviser for Student Senate. Total, less than 100 votes were cast.
“It was unfortunate because we felt like we were interacting with a lot of people,” Kinnaman said. “We’ve tried to even change how we do that information like we’ve started putting QR codes out, we put links on things so that students are taking that information with them, it’s just how do we get them to make that commitment to go on and actually do it.”
However, in addition to a well-attended first town hall meeting, Kinnaman said more students have since come to express their interest in joining Senate.
When she started working at the college in 2010, Kinnaman was told about 12 percent of students are engaged on this campus. Engagement can mean participating in athletics, working an on-campus job, getting involved with extracurricular projects such as study abroad or through clubs and organizations, she said.
In regards to the Student Senate, Kinnaman believes the biggest challenge they face is “getting their name out there”. Many students don’t know there is a Student Senate on campus, while others are just coming for class and going home, she said.
“It’s not just how can we get senate’s name out to those students who are looking for ways to get involved; how do we get it out to those who may not be looking for it but may not realize they need this in their lives?” Kinnaman said.
Both historically and during her time at the college, Kinnaman has seen the group impact the campus. Although some things take longer than others to accomplish, she said it is important for students to contribute ideas and issues that may be of concern.
“We really just need them to bring us those ideas so that we know they’re there in the first place, because each student is only aware of what they experience or what they hear,” Kinnaman said. “They may see something that we don’t, and so if somebody can just bring those ideas to the Student Senate […] we’re going to take it seriously and we’re going to see what we can do to help make it better.”
The majority of students on campus aren’t aware of Student Senate and what they do at the college, according to Rogers. During this past election, he spent time talking to students, asking students if they knew about Senate and what they do on campus.
“I don’t think I ever got a response that said I know about Student Senate, I’ve done that before or I researched that, I looked into it or I’ve heard about it,” Rogers said.
One of the misconceptions about the group is that some students perceive it is a political club, according to Rogers.
“Quite often people hear about Student Senate and they really think of a political club,” Rogers said. “There are clubs that deal very strictly with politics, but mostly, we’re an involvement club.”
Rogers said a look at the Senate’s calendar of upcoming events gives students a better understanding of what the group is.
“We try to be that outreach to students, outreach to clubs and promoting academic excellence,” Rogers said. “Those [events] aren’t political style events, those are fun things, those are trying to make this campus what we want it to be, not governing the campus, those are enhancing the campus.”
Jeffery Redmond, who was recently elected vice president of Student Senate, believes the group plays an important part in affecting the campus.
“The role of student senate is kind of like a guiding light to those who still [are] kind of trying to find their position,” Redmond said. “We need to be a focused group of leaders for the future, that’s what we are; we’re working towards the future to be the leaders of our community.”
Although the influx of new senators may be a challenge, Redmond said the college’s environment does offer advantages.
“Right now, I think the structural limitations are not as imposing as I’ve seen in other schools,” Redmond said. “We have a lot more upward mobility than I’ve seen [in] a lot of other organizations; ability to restructure is an ongoing thing.”
As leaders in Student Senate, Rogers said it is important that they maintain the correct attitude, filtering it out across campus and being leaders by example.
“The student life here, once you see student life, it’s really contagious, it draws you in,” Rogers said. “So if we can make the attitude with our goals as part of that contagiousness, then that’s really going to help.”
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