The newly elected officers in Student Government, who were chosen by the student body a little more than two weeks ago, have started the somewhat tedious process of transitioning into new positions before the end of the year.

Tim Lipka, special assistant to current Student Body President Jay Dawkins, said he has assisted president-elect Jim Ceresnak in beginning his transition process.

Lipka said he and Ceresnak have worked together to produce a Web site, tranistion.ncsu.edu, designed to inform students about open positions and allow Ceresnak to inform the student body about what is going on in SG.

“I’m required by statute to post the open positions and that’s been done by the transition Web site,” Ceresnak said. “Jim and I have talked and are working on filling those positions because certain people have to be appointed by the end of the semester.”

Numerous open positions, including director of government relations and director of community service, will be filled by Ceresnak during the coming weeks.

“I want to keep a lean staff to begin with,” Ceresnak, a junior in political science, said. “It’s easier to manage if we have a small, tight knit staff to begin with.”

The transition Web site is also a place where Ceresnak can tell the student body about some of his goals, or “Common sense solutions,” as Ceresnak calls them.

Ceresnak lists problems and goals about financial issues, student life and even traditions on campus.

Ceresnak said the transition process has gone well so far despite his lack of experience within Student Government.

“It’s been going real well,” he said. “We’ve been taking one step at a time with all the different tasks. There’s been a slight learning curve but everyone has been helping me to better understand the system.”

During the next few weeks Ceresnak said he will expand his small staff and begin to build a group of people to help him accomplish his platform goals.

“We haven’t made any appointments yet, but I feel pretty strong in my head about who my main staff will be,” Ceresnak said. “We’re going to start the recruitment process soon to fill all those positions.”

Lipka said a certain number of positions must be filled by certain dates before the end of the semester.

Newly elected Student Senate President Kelli Rogers, who took office last week, said the dates are different depending on the

position.

“It’s based on the type of appointment

it is,” Rogers said.

“There are certain positions

for Student Government that

need to continue working over

the summer so those obviously

need to be filled.”

As for Rogers’ transition into

Senate president, the junior in

political science said things have

been going smoothly.

“I have started looking through

the old files of Senate presidents

and seeing issues they have

fought for as well,” she said. “It’s

giving me new and fresh ideas.”

Lipka said the transition process

is difficult because everyone

must be on the same page at all

times.

“The hardest thing is bringing

everybody up to speed,” he said.

“There is so much Jay has done

that it makes it difficult to make

sure everyone knows what he has

done.”