Student Senate has made short strides toward change

Around this time last year when students announced their campaigns for positions within Student Senate, The Scout had concerns about the goals of the organization’s members and their capacity for enacting change on Bradley’s campus.

As we head into another year of student body officer elections, we have seen some coordinated efforts from Student Senate to take student criticisms and apply them to make measurable differences.

Two resolutions in particular were passed that could benefit the campus. An issue that was brought up by several student organizations was the need for more menstrual products in buildings. Student Senate was then able to bring a petition to the university senate to increase access to free pads and tampons in all bathrooms on campus. 

A new group of representatives was also introduced to represent fraternities and sororities. Student Senate hopes that this Greek Ad-Hoc committee will connect more with the needs of Bradley’s Greek life, which accounts for 30% of the undergraduate population. 

There have been other small additions to their work as well. When Hilltop Happenings was discontinued at the end of the fall semester, Student Senate picked up the slack by collaborating with student organizations to feature their events in weekly posts on its Instagram page. 

To address student involvement and attendance within the senate, there is now an on-campus group of senators responsible for summer recruitment during orientation sessions. A Student Senate representative said this committee has led to the highest membership the organization has seen in years. 

However, creating these committees illuminates the larger issue of recruiting students to fill the positions. Time and time again, we see that enough students aren’t getting involved. 

Each year, it’s the same message: if you want to see changes, you can step up and work toward making them a reality. Or, at the very least, you can make your feelings known by attending Student Senate general assemblies. 

There’s always room for improvement, and Student Senate can obviously take further steps to make their presence and initiatives more visible on campus, but we see that members have been taking notes on what students want. Hopefully, the incoming student body officers will build on their progress and continue connecting with people across campus.