With the spring semester underway, ASUI is looking for ways to improve the University of Idaho for its student body, ASUI President Hannah Davis said.
ASUI goals for spring 2013 include increasing funding for UI and higher education at the Legislative Breakfast Jan. 23 in Boise, improving Greek and Residence Hall student attendance for ASUI events and increasing voter contribution during ASUI spring elections.
Davis said their first goal is one of the biggest affairs all year, when 38 students travel down to Boise Jan. 22- 24 for the Legislative Breakfast.
“Wednesday is UI’s higher education day at the capitol in Boise, where President M. Duane Nellis gives a presentation,” Davis said. “Afterward, students will be meeting with local representatives and state senators, telling them why they chose UI, the scholarships they received, how funding is important for future students and why the state should continue its funding to UI, and higher education in general.”
Davis said their three main lobbying points include a change in employee compensation, a modification to Idaho Law School’s third-year program in Boise to involve second-year law students and an increase in the amount of available openings for University of Washington’s School of Medicine’s regional education program from 20 to 25 because UI is a member of the program.
“The part that affects undergrad the most is changing the employee compensation, because we want to reward the professors and instructors who are doing a good job so they’ll stay at UI,” Davis said. “We have been working on the CEC project for months. It has been a big student-run project, with a lot of collaboration with the alumni office and President Nellis — it has been really cool.”
ASUI Vice President Nick Tunison also emphasized the significance of the Legislative Breakfast.
“All of the goals better UI and affect students — but in a good way,” Tunison said. “I think as students, we have all had a faculty member or professor that has had a positive impact on us in some way during their college career, and we want to show them that the university is committed to paying them more for their hard work.”
Davis said she hopes to get more funding for UI at the Legislative Breakfast, and see the hard work done by the ASUI lobbyist Andrew Blake and students pay off.
ASUI Senate President Pro Tempore Allie Fuller said another one of ASUI’s goals is to have the student body attend more events.
“We have had pretty good attendance this year, but we want to keep students coming to all of our spring activities,” Fuller said. “A lot of work has been done with our funding board, which helps fund student organizations to make sure they get the resources to keep them running.”
Fuller also said it is important for students to vote in the upcoming ASUI elections. She said last voting season had less than 10 percent of student participation.
“Since I am in charge of the senate, personally, I want to help the senators have a better grasp of what their jobs are, so they are able to promote ASUI to the student body better, and more people will want to get involved with ASUI,” Fuller said.
Along with ASUI’s main goals, Davis discussed her personal ambitions for her last semester in office.
“I plan to speak out more in the meetings and committees’ that I sit on. I decided I must constantly be in the mindset that every issue can be an issue for someone, even if it’s just one student,” Davis said. “Just because it isn’t an issue for me doesn’t mean it’s not an issue for someone else. I’m going to make sure I have an opinion on everything that can potentially affect someone, not just me or the people I am close to.”
Michelle Gregg can be reached at [email protected]