By Ehlayna NapolitanoAssistant News Editor
A Q&A session inviting students to talk with Student Government Association members on Wednesday turned into a personalized one-on-one session when few students attended. The event in the Student Center was hosted by the SGA to invite comments, concerns and critiques. The low number of non-SGA attendees allowed for a relaxed, informal atmosphere.
President Ron Singh and vice president Andrea Standrowicz circulated potato chips and cookies, sat with students and talked with them about individual concerns, possibilities for the future and criticisms of SGA as a whole.
Some students felt this individualized interaction was very helpful.
“It’s nice to see them just coming out and connecting with students,” said Maryann Miller, fifth year senior in the Graduate Literary Studies program. “It’s good to have [them] reach out to us and ask us personally if there’s anything they could do for us.”
However, other students were more critical. Senior Lucas Gallardo, political science major, said he stopped for the free food but stayed to discuss SGA policies about which he had been previously uninformed. He also offered his own critique of school policies.
“I was thinking about some changes [that] needed to be made,” Gallardo said. “They changed the graduation commencement to be inside, two separate commencements, and you’re limited to five guests per person, which I think is really unfair.”
Gallardo said that he feels that SGA coming to talk to students personally is a good thing, but that he is also critical of their efficiency in regards to his biggest issue, the commencement changes.
“They handled my questions very well,” Gallardo said.“The situation still exists, so they clearly didn’t handle it to the point that we’re not having [commencement] inside. But they were very open to my comments and very agreeable with what I was saying. SGA as a whole I can’t speak for, but the interaction I just had was a pleasant one.”
Standrowicz and Singh, running unopposed, commented on the plans for their campaign and for next year, noting that student interaction and input was one of their main goals.
“Our main campaign strategy at this point is to just to talk to as many people as we can, to hand out quarter pages and fliers,” Standrowicz said.
Singh also noted that although students were not technically choosing them, voting was still important.
“It’s not about saying no to the other ticket; it’s about saying yes to Andrea and me,” he said.