Student Senate President Amanda Rode talked about the importance of the upcoming elections on Sept. 30 and Oct. 1. With just one more day left before the declaration period ends, Senate has just barely enough people running to fill the open positions making it a completely uncompetitive election. With 23 senators leaving senate by the end of the spring semester, the low recruitment levels and high graduating senators is resulting in an election crisis.
“We need to get strong senators in the fall so we can build people up for the upcoming year, that way Senate won’t fall apart,” senior Student Senate President Amanda Rode said.
Rode’s speech also mentioned the fact that senate will be evolving and modernizing their descriptions. Within the next few weeks the Student Senate executives will be rewriting their executive descriptions in the bylaws to keep the group more updated. They will also be removing all of the outdated descriptions.
The Latin American Student Association (LASA) requested a contingency grant to fund a DJ for their upcoming culture show on Oct. 8. LASA requested a total of $525 from the Finance Committee which approved their request. Senate also has an upcoming bill to recognize the American Institute of Chemical Engineers as an unfunded student organization. Although there was no talk on how the vote will go, approval of this bill will mean that the American Institute of Chemical Engineers will have to fundraise to raise enough money to go to their annual regional and national conferences.
Student Senate began to prepare for the upcoming homecoming events by nominating and voting for their annual king and queen for Homecoming court. All Senate recognized groups are invited to nominate one male and one female who are graduating seniors for king and queen. Among the nominations were six women nominated to be Senate’s queen and five males nominated to be Senate’s king. Senate President Amanda Rode was voted Senate’s queen and Vice President Nick Hetland was voted Senate’s king.
Senate’s nominations will have to wait to be elected onto Homecoming court, but President Amanda Rode said, “Over the last few years I’ve been on [Senate], someone from Senate has always ended up on homecoming court.”