After months of developing campaign platforms and action plans, Student Body President Taylor Wright, along with the Student Government executive board, cabinet, senate and Freshman Council are preparing to launch several new programs they hope will benefit students for years to come.
“It’s been fun to go from the campaign process, where we’re developing a flat platform, to early during the summer, early fall kind of planning forward and now I think it's around the time where things are starting to fall in place which is pretty exciting to see,” Wright said.
The fourth-year public health student said newly-elected members of Student Government are beginning to work well with the returning members, but he acknowledged getting everyone to share the same goal is the most challenging part of his job.
“Finding ways for people to kind of specialize in their areas, we have senate, we have cabinet, Freshman Council, constitutional council, finding ways for people to connect as one organization, as one student body has been kind of difficult,” Wright said.
Patrick Ellis, third-year political science student and speaker of the student senate, is impressed by the work new senators have put in to creating quality legislation to help the student body.
“In my time in the senate or involved in Student Government these past few years, I’ve never seen them, one, pushing out legislation at the rate they’re pushing out, and two, pushing out really well-crafted and deliberate legislation that has a tangible impact on campus,” Ellis said.
The pair said new programs and projects may be launched early in the spring semester. One project Wright is looking forward to is guest ticketing, which he said is ready pending approval from athletic director Ray Tanner.
“He’s been vocally supportive starting in football, but we may also have the ability to start basketball season this year,” Wright said. “You would pay at a reduced rate to bring a guest to a basketball game, baseball game, football game, things like that.”
Another project is a syllabus bank that will allow students to access all syllabuses for every class.
“So we’ve already got that built, it’s ready to go,” Wright said. “Next step is just getting faculty on board.”
A larger program Student Government is planning is the South Carolina Student Collaborative, intended to be a way for student governments from across the state to communicate and partner together on future projects.
“Basically, universities from all across the state kind of coming together on a different thing,” Wright said. “It first started as a gov-relations side of things, but it’s moved towards we can use it for flood relief, we’re going to use if for mental health resources ... we can use it for sexual assault, gun violence, really just kind of a group of people who can help amplify the message of students.”
Many of the senators working on programs and projects are newly elected sophomores who are just beginning their time with Student Government. Ellis hopes their passion will continue to permeate Student Government.
“I think the most exciting thing about having such a young senate is it really is kind of going to pave the way for what Student Government’s going to look like in the future,” Ellis said. “We’re seeing a lot of the younger senators emerge as leaders in their own right.”
Moving forward, Wright will be speaking with the Board of Trustees and Faculty Senate about programs and projects from Student Government in order make the university better.
“A lot of them, I’ve been building and working on and planning and researching, and now it's kind of the turning point where we can start, where we finally understand how things are working and who’s the best person to contact,” Wright said. “We can start getting these things in place.”