{"id":2155,"date":"2025-05-16T17:12:30","date_gmt":"2025-05-16T22:12:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/?p=2155"},"modified":"2025-05-16T17:12:30","modified_gmt":"2025-05-16T22:12:30","slug":"jcccs-next-student-senate-president-is-ready-to-get-started","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/2025\/05\/16\/jcccs-next-student-senate-president-is-ready-to-get-started\/","title":{"rendered":"JCCC’s Next Student Senate President Is Ready To Get Started"},"content":{"rendered":"

Student Senate President, Oliver Gonzales (Photo by: Elizabeth Taylor)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\n

When you think of the typical President of Student Senate, I bet your first thought isn\u2019t a 16 year old student still in high school at Blue Valley Northwest. But, Oliver Gonzales is nothing but \u201ctypical.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI am a dual degree student at Blue Valley Northwest,\u201d Gonzales said. \u201cThis year and next year, I\u2019m taking all my credits here at JCCC. I\u2019m a junior currently and I\u2019ll be a senior next year.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Some might find it a bit intimidating to be on a college campus, let alone being in charge of the student senate as a junior in high school, but Oliver faces it with an open mind.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a little weird to get advanced in schooling, but I get to get an associate\u2019s earlier and get ahead a little bit,\u201d Gonzales said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

JCCC makes the transition from high school to college smooth, even for dual credit degree students.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a little bit intimidating [being here], but JCCC is so welcoming\u00a0 and encouraging,\u201d Gonzales said. \u201cEveryone here is very helpful, the counselors, the student senate, and all the other students are welcoming.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

So, what got Oliver interested in leadership on campus?<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI [ran for President because] I was involved in the student senate this semester and no one was running for it,\u201d Gonzales said. \u201cAll of the other roles had competition, but for some reason no one wanted to be president.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

This year, Oliver was the Vice Chair of Public Relations and was encouraged by the Vice president of student senate, Olivia Mukanjiri, to run for presidency next year.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI also ran for presidency because I wanted to improve my leadership skills and get even more involved and see how the executive board of JCCC works,\u201d Gonzales added.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Gonzales moved up the ladder pretty fast and started growing his leadership positions very early in his time on student senate.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI was a senator for about two weeks last semester and then became Vice Chair,\u201d Gonzales said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Oliver is looking forward to getting to have a hand in so many things around campus as his Presidency begins.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201c[I\u2019m most excited about] seeing how everything works, how I can get more involved, run events around campus, and do the planning,\u201d Gonzales said. \u201c[I\u2019m looking forward to] making sure the student senate runs more smoothly, and also making the student senate bigger because this year it\u2019s not very known; there\u2019s not many people in the senate currently.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Gonzales is also eagerly awaiting JCCC Gives, one of the events student senate hosts.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s where the senate helps people who can\u2019t afford gifts or anything during the Christmas time,\u201d Gonzales said. \u201cWe run the student senate market and do it in the cafeteria where we do fundraising and wrap the gifts.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Oliver starts transitioning into his role as President over the summer.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cRight now I am shadowing the current President and then over the summer I will begin my duties, and then it will go into full effect at the beginning of next semester,\u201d Gonzales said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

After JCCC, Gonzales hopes to pursue engineering at the University of Kansas and eventually become an mechanical or electrical engineer.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When you think of the typical President of Student Senate, I bet your first thought isn\u2019t a 16 year old student still in high school at Blue Valley Northwest. But, Oliver Gonzales is nothing but \u201ctypical.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1001,"featured_media":2156,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advgb_blocks_editor_width":"","advgb_blocks_columns_visual_guide":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[116,299,213],"ppma_author":[128],"class_list":["post-2155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-life","tag-jccc-student-senate","tag-oliver-gonzales","tag-olivia-mukanjiri"],"author_meta":{"display_name":"Elizabeth Taylor","author_link":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/2025\/05\/16\/jcccs-next-student-senate-president-is-ready-to-get-started\/"},"featured_img":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/files\/2025\/05\/IMG_6034.jpg","coauthors":[{"link":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/2025\/05\/16\/jcccs-next-student-senate-president-is-ready-to-get-started\/","display_name":"Elizabeth Taylor"}],"tax_additional":{"categories":{"linked":["Life<\/a>"],"unlinked":["Life<\/span>"]},"tags":{"linked":["JCCC Student Senate<\/a>","Oliver Gonzales<\/a>","Olivia Mukanjiri<\/a>"],"unlinked":["JCCC Student Senate<\/span>","Oliver Gonzales<\/span>","Olivia Mukanjiri<\/span>"]}},"comment_count":"0","relative_dates":{"created":"Posted 1 year ago","modified":"Updated 1 year ago"},"absolute_dates":{"created":"Posted on May 16, 2025","modified":"Updated on May 16, 2025"},"absolute_dates_time":{"created":"Posted on May 16, 2025 5:12 pm","modified":"Updated on May 16, 2025 5:12 pm"},"featured_img_caption":"","series_order":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"authors":[{"term_id":128,"user_id":1001,"is_guest":0,"slug":null,"display_name":"Elizabeth Taylor","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/6c66e30782a78843059dfef77721e16c4ab3c33e647c30690c4e541a9bd8d151?s=96&d=mm&r=g","author_category":"","first_name":"Elizabeth","last_name":"Taylor","user_url":"","job_title":"","description":""}],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/files\/2025\/05\/IMG_6034.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2155","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1001"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2155"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2155\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2172,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2155\/revisions\/2172"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2156"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2155"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.jccc.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=2155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}