Members of student organizations may have seen some new faces at their meetings last week. These new faces were members of USC Student Government participating in a new outreach called Student Government Steps Out.
Student Government Steps Out was an event in which senate and executive cabinet members sat in on meetings of groups they were interested in, allowing them to speak about student government and also to hear feedback from the groups. According to Lauren Harper, chief of staff for Student Body President Lindsay Richardson, their hope was to use this program as a way to be more transparent to students.
Organizations were selected if they met on Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday between 5:30 p.m. and 8 p.m. These are the typical meeting times of the senate and cabinet, whose members were allowed to visit two of the 45 organizations that they were interested in.
Secretary of Multicultural Affairs Jon McClary visited the Association of African American Students’ Freshman Council.
“I shared with them exciting new things that student government has been up to,” McClary said in an email. “Being that this group was a council of 16 freshman African-American females, I spoke about the importance of student involvement and leadership and their duty to serve the Carolina community.”
A few ways SG helps student organizations is with planning and promoting events through the communications team, helping them receive money through the treasurer’s office and building ties between student leaders.
“I think by going to various organizations, it helped put names and faces to student government, making it more personal,” said Secretary of Organizational Outreach Elijah Christian in an email. “I think the organizations that were visited definitely have a better understanding of what SG does for them, and how we care about our student organizations!”
For students who have an interest not found in one of the 411 student organizations on campus, new organizations are easy to make. All it takes is at least 10 interested students and a faculty member to sponsor it.