It’d be a gross understatement to say that ASPSU has had a rough year.
The student senate repeatedly couldn’t make quorum. A Student Fee Committee member resigned, interfering with their ability to make quorum. President Courtney Morse only filled one-third of student positions for university committees. The Oregon Department of Justice has been twice involved with student government processes. And of course, there’s been the recent kerfuffle over the complete turnover of the Elections Board, along with their incompetent handling of the ASPSU elections, causing them to be postponed until the third week of spring term.
Not a very happy resume. But it’s not as simple as Morse and the rest of student government being ruthlessly incompetent. While there’s obviously been a score of errors on their part, the structure of student government could also stand some changes. While there’s obviously no be-all fix-alls, there are a couple ways in which ASPSU could largely change to be a better and more effective student government.
First, student government should be more visible to the average PSU student, both in what they do and who is doing it. While many students are highly displeased with ASPSU lately, many students are also highly apathetic, and it’s a little hard to blame them when the actions of student government aren’t that visible to the public.
What student government should do to fix this is two-fold. First, they should publicize themselves better. For all their bungling this year, they work hard and continue to be responsible for providing a student voice to the administration. But due to the nature of such work, it’s not something most of us see.
Students should not have to dig to find out what their government is doing for them; student government should be able to let their students know what’s happening. They could have someone dedicated to keeping student publications up to date with the work they do, and certainly do a better job of updating their website (www.aspsu.pdx.edu), which has spotty-at-best information on what’s happening inside ASPSU.
Second, student government should include get-involved student activities on their to-do lists. A lot of PSU students are super time-crunched, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible to get students interested in campus events. Earlier in the year, ASPSU planned a candlelight dinner to raise awareness on student diversity. This was a good idea. They should plan more social events that emphasize student issues, and make enough of them to include a wide swath of students.
This may smack of cutesy fluff activities one would associate with freshmen in a dorm, but it doesn’t have to. Overall, ASPSU should be more integrated with the student body it serves, and make the organization more active in the lives of students.
Student government could stand to make a big change. ASPSU has an enormous problem just getting bodies into seats. This is evidenced by the failures of the senate and the Student Fee Committee to meet quorum, and the brouhaha over Morse’s ability to only fill one-third of student positions on university committees. And, as mentioned many times this year, the bodies that have gotten into seats haven’t been doing a bang-up job.
So why does this happen? More than 23,000 people go to our school, and it’s not a stretch to believe that many of them would be qualified and competent enough to take part in student government. But they don’t seem inclined to do so, and ASPSU should do a better job of attracting top-quality individuals to work within its ranks.
One way to bring this about is to make ASPSU more active in student life, as previously said. But ASPSU should also make being part of student government worthwhile. They should make it well known how to get involved, make the benefits of getting involved also well known, and increase said benefits.
Earlier in the year, there was conflict over whether to pay student senators for their time. To even bring this into question is ridiculous. They should be paid, and paid well, as should all those who put multiple hours of their week into student government. We cannot demand decent job performance if we are not willing to give back decent compensation. If the funds simply aren’t available, tuition reductions and further educational credit aren’t bad ideas either.
Some have said that we should expect those in student government to do their jobs without much expectation of compensation, following the understandable reasoning that those who perform such important jobs shouldn’t be motivated by benefits. But this line of thinking is faulty. We simply can’t expect highly competent people to choose to work in student government if we don’t make it worth their while, especially if those competent people are often taking full course-loads and working one or two jobs. People who could run ASPSU really well? They’re around. People who could run ASPSU really well and currently have boatloads of time on their hands? Not so much.
Student government doesn’t have to be in its current undesirable state, and the state it’s in isn’t entirely the fault of those who are running it. If we want a competent and accountable ASPSU, then its structure and ways of operation need to be changed. This is difficult, but it’s very doable. Student government can change for the better, be it the ASPSU of today, or the ASPSU of tomorrow. Maybe the latter will be someone you know. Maybe it’ll be you.