Roadblocks ahead
for SGA
by Clayton Woullard
The Metropolitan
The Metro Student Government Assembly is looking toward what they consider
a brighter future—one in which the student government makes a strong
effort to represent the students, and students actually know who and what
their student government is.
But some heavy roadblocks may lie in the path of that future.
SGA President Candace Gill said the SGA’s main goals for this year
include writing a new constitution, establishing more communication with
students, evaluating student fees and how students view them, and becoming
more autonomous. She said her main goal is to educate the students on
the issues that concern them.
“It’s really important for students to open up their eyes
and open up their ears to what’s going on this campus and to get
involved and ask questions,” Gill said.
She and other officials have said they have encountered problems—mostly
in the form of opposition from the administration—in fulfilling
their goals.
“We can’t possibly fulfill our campaign promises because
we’re too busy fighting for our rights to do our job,” said
William Safford, SGA Attorney General.
Safford said the SGA really wants to become more autonomous from the
administration because it would allow them a lot more freedom, but that
may not settle well with administrators.
“The administration doesn’t want a student government that
does its job,” Safford said. “They want a student government
that stays out of the way.”
Officials said they have already met with opposition from the administration
this summer and this semester.
Gill said about a week and a half before SGA officials were to head to
the mountains near Nederland for a retreat earlier this summer, they were
told by the administration that a college official must accompany them
as supervision on their trip. When SGA officials were not able to find
any college policy stating such a requirement, Gill said she turned to
Metro’s interim President Ray Kieft. Gill said Kieft sent her a
policy she feels he and Metro’s legal counsel Lee Combs basically
created in a short period of time.
Safford described it as “imaginary policy and creative label-writing”
on Combs’ part.
Gill emphasized that the SGA wants to cooperate with the administration,
yet have more freedom in order to better represent the students.
“We’re not asking to be completely separate from the college,”
she said. “We’re asking to play a role in how the college
operates. We want to work with the administration, not against them.”
In the most recent SGA meeting, held last Thursday, SGA officials discussed
not being able to communicate with students through the MetroConnect e-mail
system because administrators told them they must have prior permission
from student services.
“We are the only representatives of the students and we need to
be able to communicate with them in this way,” Safford said in the
meeting. “This is something we need to figure out: how to fight
for and what we need to fight for.”
Gretta Mincer, student services representative on the SGA, said last
year’s SGA tried developing a communication policy, but it was never
agreed upon.
Officials agreed in the meeting to begin working on a communication policy
that they hope would allow them to communicate with students, especially
through e-mail, without approval from the administration.
“I really think if we show we can restrict it,” Safford said,
“the most important thing will come out and that’s that we
not be edited.”
Being able to communicate with students would not only allow them the
opportunity to educate the student body about the SGA and important issues,
but they could receive student input, especially in regard to student
fees, which is part of a project the SGA is working on this year.
The SGA has begun handing out surveys to students for input on their
knowledge of how student fees work, where they go and how they feel about
how the fees being handled.
“The students deserve to know where their money is going and they
have a legal right to know,” Safford said.
Brian Glotzbach, SGA Vice President of Student Fees, said it seems most
students, and even many administrators, don’t know where their student
fees go and how they operate.
“I don’t think the level of knowledge is as high as it should
be,” Glotzbach said.
He said one of his main concerns regarding student fees is the issue
of course fees becoming program, or department fees. Currently, certain
departments charge students a fee for supplemental supplies for certain
classes, such as in the art department where students may have to pay
a course fee for paint supplies. Under the change, departments that charge
course fees would be able to charge all students in all courses in that
department, regardless of whether it has a course fee or not.
The Metro Board of Trustees is set to vote on the policy next Wednesday
during their first meeting of the semester. Gill said she thinks the board
will approve it because it would consolidate money that comes from 300
courses to money from 30 departments.
She said legally the board has to confer with the SGA before making such
changes, but because the fee change will be revenue neutral for the school,
or result in no increase in money for the school, they can approve it
without student input.
“Just because it’s revenue neutral for the school, doesn’t
mean it’s revenue neutral for the students,” she said.
Glotzbach said the main goal of the student fees project is to give more
power to students over their student fees.
“Ultimately, I would like students to have a say in what their
student fees are being used for,” he said. “I want there to
be some solid accountability so at least a student knows what he’s
paying for.”
More student control is one reason the SGA is looking to re-write the
SGA constitution.
They want to write a new constitution from scratch that would be more
specific on the limits to the SGA’s power, as well as to address
concerns that previous SGAs have had to deal with but had no policies
in place to address them.
“Some of the problems that have erupted in the SGA’s past
have resulted from bad policies,” said Beth Ott, SGA Vice President
of Communications.
Ott also said another problem with the constitution is that it gives
the SGA the power to remove an official for any reason, and replace the
official without student input.
“That’s an awful lot of power with no checks and balances,”
she said.
Safford, who will head up the re-writing effort, said the SGA would most
likely conduct student surveys, meet with students, or perhaps form a
group of 20 to 50 students to give input about the document.
“I actually envision a constitution that is more than just how
the SGA works,” he said. “It could include just about anything
the student body thinks is important. I don’t just want to limit
it to structure and operation.”
Glotzbach said it’s important that the administration realize the
SGA is going to represent the concerns of the student body and not just
blindly approve policies.
“We’re not here to rubber-stamp policies,” he said.
“We’re here to keep the student body educated and aware of
what’s going on.”
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