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Student Body President: term in review

It’s only been 114 days since the 2016 presidential election, but in a few short weeks, the voting booths will open once again for Bradley students.

 With Student Body Officer elections coming up on March 27 and 28, current Student Body President Jenna Dellaria’s term will draw to a close. In the past year, Dellaria, her executive board and other members of Student Senate have been working towards improving campus for all students.

“My main purpose for my term was to focus a lot on sexual assault awareness, as well as promoting more diversity and inclusion on campus,” Dellaria said.

Dellaria, a junior elementary and special education double major, said her main goal was to create a more welcoming and safe environment for all students around campus. She said she hopes to see the future student body officers continue the work of her term.

“I just really want [future officers] to push for that sexual assault awareness,” Dellaria said. “I think this is the time to really move forward with that, [between] the Title IX resolution [and] all the awareness campaigns that we could be doing. I think that’s something that I want to see more on campus.”

Dellaria also said she wants to see one last resolution pass before her term is up.

“I know Smoke-Free Campus has been going on for such a long time,” Dellaria said. “If anything were to happen before my term ends, I’d want that to be done.”

While she admitted to not passing as many resolutions as planned, Vice President for Student Affairs Nathan Thomas said her work and progress will not go unnoticed.

“It’s a little bit unfair to judge a student senator by the resolutions that they pass or the number of resolutions,” Thomas said. “I think there are other ways that you can be effective, and I think that will be the reflection of Jenna and her group. Certainly they passed a lot of meaningful resolutions, but there’s been a lot of work that they’ve done that just doesn’t show up on the scorecard sometimes.”

Speaker of the Assembly Dave Jensen attributed a lot of the year’s successes to Dellaria’s work ethic and leadership.

“She really cares about the topics, and at the end of the day, that’s what it’s all about,” Jensen said. “You have to care about what you’re doing, and I think that’s how she kind of ran our [executive] board, and I think that’s why we were really successful.”

While Dellaria said she would love to run for re-election, her schedule next year does not allow for it, and she wants to see new leadership.

“Even if I could run again, I think it’s just more important [to let] another student step up and take the role,” Dellaria said. “Have them bring some new ideas to the table, and have them work more closely with the administration on their own ideas.”

Jensen said he feels Dellaria left the students with a great example of a leader and big shoes to fill.

“I think that she’s really just a good role model for everybody, whether that be the rest of the SBOs, the Cabinet or just the general senators, let alone the student body to look up to,” Jensen said. “She really just embodies what a student body president should be.”

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