From the president
Elections: It has been almost a week since the Congressional elections and what an exciting and close election it has been! I wanted to take this time to remind everyone that the scope of the influence of SGA is not limited to the campus itself: We work to make sure that the voices of VCU students are heard far and wide from City Hall to the Capitol.
Elections: It has been almost a week since the Congressional elections and what an exciting and close election it has been! I wanted to take this time to remind everyone that the scope of the influence of SGA is not limited to the campus itself: We work to make sure that the voices of VCU students are heard far and wide from City Hall to the Capitol. During the Virginia General Assembly sessions, each student senator is required to lobby on issues related to higher education. In preparation for the 2006 elections, we successfully ran a voter registration drive, an absentee ballot drive and a student poll worker program called Democracy 101.
Democracy 101: The Democracy 101 Poll Worker program was a joint project between the SGA and Virginia21. We encouraged VCU students to sign up to be poll workers on Election Day. The average age of a poll worker is 72, so we thought it’d be great to get more young people involved in the process and make some money! Every poll worker earned around $125 for working that day. This year we had 15 VCU students working at 11 different precincts. Everyone reported good things about our poll workers and asked for their help for elections in the future. At one precinct one woman said that our poll workers were so much more pleasant to work with than ones from University of Richmond, with whom she had worked with in the past. Congratulations to these students!
Leadership Changes: Student Senate Vice-Chair Hiwie Yohannes recently stepped down. An election was held and the Senate chose Legislative Issues Chair Stephanie Kinard to be the new Senate Vice-Chair. Stephanie is an extremely active senator and has experienced serving as the legislative issues and civic action committee chair as well as a member of the Elections committee. She brings a wealth of knowledge with her, and I’m confident she will do an excellent job.
Building Community: One of our major projects is the Small Community Initiative. The goal is to create the feel and atmosphere of a small liberal arts college within each academic unit at VCU. Some of the specific plans we have to build the community are to have e-mail Listservs for each major, intellectual events such as debates and speeches, more publicity for internship and research opportunities and getting the deans and associate deans involved in the process. Right now, SGA Major Projects Director Tayeeb Faruk is working with VCU faculty to create Small Community Initiatives pilot programs for the psychology and english departments. For more information please e-mail projects@vcusga.com.
SGA positions open: Finally, are you looking for a fun, engaging way to gain leadership experience and meet a lot of cool people in the process? Ever wanted to contribute to your student government without having to deal with a meddlesome campaign? Then don’t be elected, be appointed!
The SGA cabinet is searching for talented and motivated individuals like you to fill the spots of deputy for external affairs (deals with community relations and alumni affairs), deputy for finance (treasurer), deputy for development (graphic design, Web design), and deputy chief of staff. Think you’re up for the challenge? If so, e-mail a paragraph statement of intent and resume to Chief of Staff LeaAnne Eaton at chief@vcusga.com.
