Student Senate to create committee to publicize Senate, improve communication and promote campus events
Student Senate is considering creating a new subcommittee, which would help coordinate student activities and organizations and inform students about what Student Senate does.
“I don’t know much about what Student Senate does except take students’ problems to administrators,” sophomore business major Mike Matway said.
Two percent of the student population voted in the Student Senate election, and as first semester nears its end there are still empty seats.
“I think the possibility of the committee has potential, but first, I think it is important to get some ideas down and see if we can work with what we have,” Student Body President Jordan Ticaric said.
Senate already contains a Student Relations committee, which planned the event ‘Speak Up!’
“I believe that Student Relations has taken a large leap in the positive direction from other years, and the committee is doing exactly what it should be doing,” Ticaric said. “However, I am sure that all aspects of Senate need some improvement, and I am eager to hear the new ideas.”
Junior multimedia major Bob Wise said he thinks Senate could improve by making their actions more easily known.
“I think they are doing a moderate amount of reaching out to students, but not nearly enough,” he said.
Ticaric said aside from its own publicity, Senate does not have to promote other events and organizations but still can. The proposed new committee would help promote campus events.
“I also know that there are some organizations that go nuts with publicizing [their events] – those usually turn out to be the best attended,” she said. “However, I see that there are events that [don’t have] a good turnout, and those groups may not be using the office as a resource or the outlets of other major organizations on campus, such as Student Senate, to help spread the word.”
The proposed committee could also help Senate gain more publicity. The idea of a weekly newsletter was discussed during Senate’s meeting on Monday.
“I think it would be a good idea for Student Senate to send out a newsletter and let students know what they are doing,” sophomore business major Jay Jasse said.
Ticaric said a campus-wide newsletter could be a possibility.
“Last year, secretary Todd Moore made a newsletter called the ‘BodyBuilder’ and it did share a lot of information regarding Senate’s workings to a large amount of students,” she said. “I’m sure something like that could happen again.”
A campus wide weekly e-mail of Senate’s activities was also considered, but Ticaric said privacy might be an issue in getting students’ e-mail addresses.
“I can’t have everyone’s e-mail, so I have to go through the right channels to reach the entire student body through an e-mail,” she said.
Ticaric said she thinks Senate is going well.
“It has actually been a pretty good year,” she said. “We’ve had consistent petitions for open seats and great reports come from our Senators. We are reaching a large amount of students because of things we’re accomplishing and more people want to be part of that.”
