One thing that makes N.C. State great is its diversity. And this time we aren’t referring to different races or gender, but rather to the great diversity in age we see across campus each day.

Sometimes it feels like we can we see the complete range of life from one to the other across campus. Young parents who bring their children to meetings predominantly populated by the twenty-something college crowd is typical on a campus, and inevitably there is the older generation — the ones returning to school after many years of work.

However, amongst all of the students enrolled on campus there is a group seeking positions in elected offices on campus — part-time students.

From the over-achieving high school student to the senior citizen hammering away at a degree, these students unfortunately should not have the same opportunity to represent their fellow students.

We’re sorry. We know how hard you are working, but we are being practical about this. If a student cannot commit enough time to enroll full time in the University, how can they be expected to sacrifice the time it takes to hold an office on campus? These college-age politicians do work long hours and commit a majority of their time to campaigning and coming up with frivolous bills and motions.

We do not question part-time students’ commitment to the University. We are sure their reasons for not enrolling full time are valid, even some of us have been part-time students in the past, and we do not think the time they spend on campus is equivalent to the passion they might have for change.

Most of the students involved in Student Government are full-time students and as the campus has witnessed over the past term they do not do very much work or appear to really care about campus.

So for all of you part-timers interested in running for Student Government we suggest you add a few hours to your schedule and get your name on the ballot next year. We think working hard to become a full-time will show a commitment most Student Government officials take for granted. We want to hear and write about the student who worked their way up from taking a couple of classes to becoming a full-time student just so they could help change our campus and not just looking to spice up their resume.