As part of an ongoing initiative to improve transparency among the student body, the Student Government (SG) has begun publishing monthly updates for students, which are included as part of the weekly HOWL.
“The monthly updates are great, because there’s a lot of behind-the-scenes work that we do that is not as obvious as putting on an event on campus,” said Meredith Spence-Beaulieu, student body vice president and graduate student studying entomology.
The monthly updates help provide a clear, concise picture of what Student Government accomplishes each month.
“Along with other tools like our platform progress page on the SG website, this helps with transparency by communicating the things that we are working on to the general student body in public and easy-to-digest ways,” Spence-Beaulieu said.
According to Taylor Pulliam, the director of communications for SG and a fourth-year studying political science, the monthly updates have increased student engagement and made it easier for all students to receive necessary information pertaining to Student Government.
“A lot of the stuff that happens is hard to digest unless you sit down and read through it,” Pulliam said.
In addition to the monthly updates in the HOWL, the communications team also shares updates through Facebook and Twitter.
“These posts have been the highest-shared on our social media pages,” Pulliam said.
The posts also helped reach students who might not otherwise be aware of what goes on in Student Government.
“Students have said to me, ‘I didn’t know this is something Student Government did,’” Pulliam said.
Last week’s monthly updates included information on the proposal for gender-inclusive housing, information on the early voting location in Talley Student Union and updates on decisions related to tuition and fees, among other things.
“It also has the added benefit of keeping us accountable to our platform and making sure that we are making progress on things each and every month,” Spence-Beaulieu said.
Although the monthly updates generally consist of initiatives that come from the executive branch, Student Senate President Adam Schmidt, a third-year studying civil engineering, explained how the monthly updates reflect Student Government as a whole.
“A lot of senators are currently researching issues that they’re passionate about, or trying to compare what we do at NC State to other institutions in the UNC System or our peer institutions,” Schmidt said. “They’re getting the ball rolling on some of their projects that they’re working on.”
The monthly updates help publicize some of these projects, such as the ongoing initiative to encourage the use of green books made from recycled paper instead of blue books, as well as a proposal to change the policies surrounding multiple exams in one week.
“Producing monthly updates was not a part of Jess and my campaign platform,” Spence-Beaulieu said. “Although it has always been a goal of ours to be transparent and communicative with our actions, so this fits in nicely with that goal.”
For any student who is interested in finding more information about the monthly updates or the work of Student Government, more information is available here.
