The Facts: Kelli Rogers, student senate president, recently announced that she would appoint a senator to Student Government’s vacant press secretary position. The appointee will be in charge of synthesizing Student Senate actions and proposals and relaying that information to the student body and press.
Our Opinion: The press secretary position runs contrary to Student Government’s efforts to facilitate discourse on campus issues. It is unnecessary and convolutes the established modes of objective communication between Student Government and the University populace.
Student Senate and Student Government’s elected officials have made a push this year to interact and connect with students.
Many students were miffed about Senate’s actions in regard to the fee referendum and the Talley-Atrium project recommendation. As a result, Senate has made a conceited effort to get down-on-the-ground with students and rebrand the organization.
In a backwards extension of that logic, Senate has decided that to better inform students it requires a press secretary.
The position is totally unnecessary and actually serves to undermine the established mode of objective communication between the student body and its elected officials.
The press secretary position’s primary goal is to synthesize the happenings of Student Senate’s meetings and convey that information to the media and the student body at-large.
Kelli Rogers, student senate president, said the position is simply another form of communication between Student Government and its constituents — students.
The unpaid position is appointed by Rogers and must be filled by a member of Student Senate.
Facilitating different streams of communication between Student Government and the student body is an admirable goal. Students deserve to be objectively informed on the issues that Student Government is discussing — many of those issues have a direct impact on students.
The University’s two newspapers already synthesize and condense the information so the student body, faculty and administration can stay informed about Senate’s proposals and activities.
From an external perspective, the position of press secretary seems to be yet another middleman between students and the actions of a University governing bodies.
It is reminiscant of the middlemen Oblinger’s administration used to hide e-mail and conceal its true actions.
The position also presents the notion that the Senate could begin speaking publicly solely through the press secretary to maintain a unified message.
A press secretary in and of itself creates a slippery slope that could easily lead to message modification and a subjective analysis of Senate and Student Government actions.
Good intentions may have gone into filling the vacant position, but it seems unnecessary and runs contrary to Student Government’s recent efforts to connect with students.
