Emma Carter is NC State’s UNC Association of Student Governments delegate. Carter is currently a second-year studying criminology and international studies. Technician sat down with her to talk about the specificities of ASG.
The entire interview with Carter will be released this week as a bonus episode of our podcast, Dialogue with Technician, which you can find on iTunes, Overcast, and most other places podcasts are available. Here is an excerpt from the interview.
What is ASG? What does ASG do?
ASG is the Association of Student Governments, which unites all 17 schools in the UNC System. It’s meant to speak up for the students and advocate for the best interests of them, and increase awareness of issues across campus, so integrating those issues between all the schools.
Why is ASG important to the student body?
ASG is important to students because, as many students don’t know, they contribute a dollar each year to ASG, and those funds go together to form grants and fund ASG. Those grants come back to students when they apply for them for student organization projects.
How did you, as a student, find out about ASG?
I was involved last year on the Government Relations Committee of Student Government, and I wanted to get more involved, but I didn’t know how I could do it. Then, applications for exec cabinet came out and this position was really interesting to me because I got to interact with people not only here at NC State, but, of course, all other 17 schools. I think it’s interesting to find out what issues are important here, and what issues are important at other schools, as well.
What are your goals for this year?
Our goals are mainly to increase awareness about what ASG is. In the past, I feel like people don’t really know what that [ASG] is and don’t know how to get those funds to fund projects here at school. I think that’s the most important thing. We are the largest school in the UNC System, as NC State, so we put a lot of money in, and we want to get a lot of money back out. We are encouraging students to get in touch with us, and apply for those grants.
What is an example of a grant students can apply for?
There is a large grant fund in the budget for the year. Let’s say you have an event that deals with voter education, and you want people to know. For example at NC State, we are informing students about the mayoral race, and who’s running for those positions, so that would be a good way to get funding for an event that you could promote on campus. Maybe you could even host some of those mayoral candidates here at NC State.
How is ASG different than Student Government?
ASG is different because it is kind of like SG on the state level, but we’re meant to speak up for all students versus just representing students of certain colleges or ethnicities. We’re representing all people coming together. I think that’s what’s cool about ASG is that it’s bringing everyone together, whereas here, we’re just focused about what’s going on at our school.
Is it hard for all of the schools to agree on certain topics or is it more unanimous?
It’s hard because typically there is one or two schools that are the outcasts, if you will, who have a different position on what they feel should be approved or what should be brought to the table. I feel like a lot of the times though we come to good consensus of what we need to do and how the issue needs to be resolved. Ultimately, it turns out okay — we all come together.
For students that are looking to get involved with ASG, do you have any words of advice?
Get involved! That’s the biggest thing is to take the risk, get involved, throw yourself into something new that maybe you wouldn’t normally do. That’s exactly what I did. I mean, I did Student Government in high school, but this was new for me. I was like, “I don’t know how to do this. This is kind of scary.” But I just did it, and then, here I am, and I think it’s really cool that I get to do this position.
