Zoë Strickland | Editor-in-Chief
After a nearly-two-week campaign quest to meet the mandated 10 percent student voting quota, the 2018-2019 Associated Students of Western Oregon University leaders were announced on May 4.
Evelyn Guzman, who currently serves as ASWOU Vice President, was elected to the position of President for 2018-2019, while Erik Morgan Jr. was elected to fill Guzman’s seat as Vice President. Current Director of State and Federal Affairs Nathan Soltz was elected to serve as ASWOU Senate President, and Logan Doerfler was re-elected as Judicial Administrator. Both Jamie Norr and Rowan Hammer were elected Senators — this will be Norr’s second year as part of the branch. At the time of publication, there are pending write-ins for Senate, Judicial Board and Incidental Fee Committee members.
There were a total of 511 votes cast, with 10.9 percent of Western’s student body being represented.
The new pack of ASWOU leaders have proposed widespread goals, including: reworking the IFC process, encouraging further student involvement, promoting diversity and inclusion on campus and creating an open communication between students and Western’s administration.
Two of Soltz’s goals involve changing the ASWOU governing documents and overhauling the IFC: “Our current Governing Documents are vague,” he said. “I have served, and continue to serve, as the Rules Committee Chair and Parliamentarian for several organizations; I know well what bylaws and governing documents should look like and our current ones check very few of those boxes.”
When it comes to the IFC, Soltz plans to mend how the committee operates; “As things are now, the IFC creates its own bylaws and in those bylaws, it dictates to the Senate what the Senate can and cannot do and makes it so that only the IFC can remove one of its members; these are just two of the most egregious parts of the IFC process, in addition to the IFC being mentioned only in passing by our governing documents without it ever being clearly established.”
Senate member Norr stated in her candidacy mission statement that she wants to focus on making Western accepting and receptive to student needs: “I believe that our student government should be an open space where everyone can voice their opinions and have their ideas heard … I hope to assist in creating a safe and accepting school by listening to fellow students, advocating for changes, speaking out against discrimination or notions that may harm students, and working towards a better community.”
For more information regarding ASWOU, visit wou.edu/aswou.
Contact the author at journaleditor@wou.edu
