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At last Thursday’s Student Government Presidential and Vice Presidential debate, the topic of student apathy— or maybe ignorance — toward the organization was mentioned. Students should take more interest in the elections, as well as the organization in general.
Here’s why: First off, SG elections — which are being held Thursday — are easy. A little box will pop up on all FirstClass desktops, where students can quickly vote for one of the three presidential candidates and one of the two vice presidential candidates. It’s that simple. It takes seconds.
Second, though students may feel SG representatives are far removed from their own University of Maine experience, it does affect them. True, General Student Senate has just been the allowance-provider for student organizations for too long, but the campus community got the downtown Orono shuttle, medical amnesty, free newspapers and Zipcar — admittedly, that last example failed miserably — because of efforts by Student Government. The organization provides a service to students.
Lastly, regardless of the success of Student Government to improve students’ lives, the elected members of the organization do try, often with great diligence, to make campus life better for undergraduates. Not making an informed vote in the elections this Thursday is an insult to everyone in Student Government that is and will continue trying to make the community a better place for students.
Student-elected representatives take their job seriously. They just don’t have the student support that could make Student Government a much more powerful tool. We should vote Thursday, and then we should start thinking about going to the Wade Center for Student Leadership once in a while and actually talking to the people we voted for. We should tell them about our issues with on-campus dining, or tell them what they should do to influence the administration on pricing, fees, tuition, parking, events or any number of aspects of campus life students feel should be changed.
The elections won’t be like state or federal elections. You don’t have to drive to get to a polling location and then wait in line to fill in a bunch of circles or connect some arrows. It’s simple, easy and quick and if students don’t take the time to vote, then they have to be the most lazy and apathetic collection of people on the planet.
Last year, 1,351 people voted for the presidential candidates, a number that can be improved. Strangely, people get adversarial or heated whenever someone recommends they vote for a SG candidate. Students call it a waste of time, as if a few seconds is such an incredibly vast expense for them.
Whether Student Government is as significant an organization as it could be doesn’t matter. But students have an opportunity to make sure it is all it should be available to them. What’s better, it requires very little effort and has plenty of potential of positively affecting them.
Last year’s election was Rick-rolled by write-ins after a student encouraged others to vote for Rick Astley instead of Ross Wolland, nearly de-railing the election. What else do students not care about? Getting an education? What a joke. Fantasy football, beer pong or even studying can wait for a few minutes of research and a few clicks of the mouse.
Choosing not to vote means Student Government will continue to represent only a minority of students. This may not mean much to many students, but it should because the group will never grow past its money-distributing role without good leadership. And only through active student participation will that leadership emerge.
Maybe Student Government is only half as good as it could be. But if that’s true, it’s not Student Government’s fault. It’s the fault of those students who don’t care enough about it.
Dylan Riley is news editor for The Maine Campus.
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