Though Matt Ball ’08 is a well-qualified candidate, and we believe that he would make an excellent WSA president, it is disappointing to see him running unopposed.
Why don’t people want to be WSA president? We’re a campus of smart, opinionated people, yet we have neglected a position of real consequence. And this isn’t about power, it’s about opportunity.
Students often complain that the WSA is powerless, that their verbose resolutions have little visible effects on campus, that they communicate poorly, and that they often fight students instead of representing them. Yet here was a chance for change, and no one looked to it, no one offered their voice or opinion for constructive ends.
WSA positions are thankless jobs, perhaps. They require long hours and hard work. We here at Wesleyan don’t go in for decorum, and student government positions here don’t have the same kind of prestige that they carry at other institutions. But even if we’re going to downplay prestige, we can’t ignore good causes. The WSA needs a overhaul. Student interest and participation is, frankly, pathetic. The WSA might claim that their mandate is to make policy, not engage students. We strongly disagree.
We have some suggestions to help the WSA get the student body more involved and interested in student government affairs.
Physical polling places on campus might increase the amount of student participation in elections. Electronic voting systems are impersonal and make it easier for students to disregard the election. Deleting an e-mail informing students of elections is easy, but ignoring a bustling polling station, perhaps in front of the campus center, would be harder.
We also think that the WSA should require a minimum number of student votes in order to pass resolutions. Only 81 students voted on the recent changes to the WSA Constitution. 220 students voted on the chalking resolution. The WSA should represent the majority of students, not 81 or 220 of them. If the WSA had to get a minimum number of votes on each resolution, then they would be forced to reach out to students and involve them in student government. And then maybe then we’d have a presidential election with more than one candidate.
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