With 16 students, University Senate has the most student senators in the history of the university this year, said Student Association President Jon Barnhart.

The increase comes from a combination of SA’s recruiting efforts and students’ desires to become involved on campus, Barnhart said.

‘The people that come up are very conscious of what they want to do and have a very clear vision of why they want to be part of the senate,’ he said.

Students looking to become senators need to apply and get elected by SA. In the past couple of years, SA has received an increasing number of applications from qualified candidates, Barnhart said.

‘If you are going into a job that involves having experience at every level of administration, this is a great place to start,’ he said.

Student senators vote on issues alongside faculty and administrators who serve as senators and on committees that address all aspects of campus, from student life to the university budget to issues about diversity and the LGBT community. USen is divided in 18 committees, of which students have the opportunity to become chairs.

Having students in USen is a way to make sure students’ concerns are being heard, Barnhart said.

‘At the University Senate level, the student opinion is weighed equally with the faculty opinion,’ Barnhart said. ‘If we don’t have undergraduate senators, that opinion is never presented, and sometimes we don’t see students being considered in important decisions.’

Faculty and administrators appreciate and respect student participation in USen, Barnhart said. He said at least five committee chairs have told him they would like to have more undergraduate participation.

Jonathan Massey, chair of the Agenda Committee, said the presence of students in USen is crucial for the decision-making process.

‘These questions all impact students differently than they might faculty and staff,’ Massey said. ‘Student senators are in a position to learn what the issues are and to weigh in on decisions about how to proceed.’

One of the priorities of Massey’s committee this year is to promote more student involvement across the board. He said the increase of student participation in USen is ‘impressive and encouraging,’ but that their challenge will be to stay engaged.

It can be hard for students to dedicate time and focus on USen issues with all their other commitments, he said.

Some students are not able to attend committee meetings due to time conflicts. This is the case of Jennifer Altoff, a senior in the Academic Affairs Committee. Altoff has class at the same time her committee meets, which prevents her from being as involved as she used to be, she said.

When she joined two semesters ago, she actively participated in the planning of the annual MayFest celebration. She said this issue was one of the examples in which she saw the effectiveness of being able to influence the university’s decisions.

‘There is a lot of faculty and administration, and sometimes the voice of the students can get drowned out,’ Altoff said. ‘It’s nice to be able to speak up.’

bfgraula@syr.edu

Published on November 9, 2010 at 12:00 pm