This year’s Students’ Association elections will be held March 20 and 21, and while candidates prepare for the election, the presidency and vice presidency already have its newest tenants.
Current Administrative Assistant Allyson Monson and State and Local Government Chair Spencer Harwood will be running unopposed in the upcoming presidential and vice presidential SA elections. Now that their victory is imminent, they are preparing for the election and their future with SA.
Monson and Harwood said they look to use SA as a platform for students to voice their concerns and extend their hand to the student body.
“One of the things that Spencer and I have as a platform is ‘share the vision,’” Monson said. “It’s this idea that this body isn’t just making decisions, but that we’re bringing the students together.”
Monson said this idea relates directly to General Activity Fee (GAF) strategic planning and aligning the budget of SA with it. The GAF is a mandatory fee paid by students according to credit hours to support the Wellness Center, Union and student activity programs such as plays and athletic programs.
Monson wants to look at the idea of GAF increasing and see what students would get out of it to alleviate concerns that come with them.
Since Monson and Harwood look to connect more with the students of South Dakota State, they feel there is a need to interact with different groups on campus.
“It’s generally a common theme that we need to attend more meetings of student organizations and groups in order to get a better understanding of how they see campus and how it should be run,” Harwood said.
Monson and Harwood said they’d like to turn their attention to action to benefit students. One idea is to revive a program that never took off called “Student Forward.”
The program was originally led by Brookings Mayor Keith Corbett when he was a part of the University College at SDSU.
Harwood wants to bring the program up again and said it would allow struggling students to take a lighter credit load and work in their career field with a local company to gain experience.
As far as running unopposed, Monson said she would have liked to run against someone else because it would gain attention for SA and address its mission and goals. She has now turned her attention to the body’s elections.
“It’s less about us as we need to get students out to vote,” Monson said. “There are other students running, and students need to know that these are their representatives.
