I may be a new face in Student Government, but I do have leadership experience as the president of the Raleigh Wesley Foundation. I have also participated in countless service projects around campus including Shackathon, Service Raleigh, Relay for Life and many more.
With this background and my previous campus work, which I received University Housing’s Community Builder Award for, that I can effectively place Student Government back into the hands of the students. My goal as president will be to put “students first” when it comes to making decisions using unity, transparency and accountability. I feel that Student Government’s role on campus is to serve the student body in a way that not only puts students’ interests first but also unifies the University. Cross-college programs such as University-wide competitions and interactive dialogues between the students in different colleges and college councils will help enthuse and excite this incredibly intelligent student body.
As an engineer I know how important Centennial Campus is to the University. We need to push to bridge the gap between our two largest campuses by encouraging the construction of the monorail system between the two campuses.
Transparency is another way in which I wish to further progress student input in Student Government. The Ralley4Talley incident is a prime example of the lack of transparency between students and their leaders — it needs to change. If we are going to propose such a large, sweeping change to the University, we need to educate the student body as actively as possible and give them both sides of the equation –really striving to gain their input and act on it. If you say no — I say no. As president I would place boxes around campus where students can write their ideas and opinions and I will personally address them at Student Government meetings. I hope that students will hold me accountable for all of my actions, and I will take full responsibility if students are not heard. One of the more entertaining ideas I have is to let students be heard in an NCSU-commercial video challenge, which I will work to have the winning video become one of the voices of our campus. I would like to thank you for your time; and remember, who doesn’t like Lego?
