In this year's crowded field of aspirants trying to become the Student Confederation's next president, a cast of characters emerges. There's Polson Kanneth, who hawks his experience working with the administration. Contrast that to "Big" Steve Gilbert, the gregarious Pike fraternity brother who touts his "outsider" image and his lack of student government experience. Will Mount promises a state-of-the-art entertainment center smack dab in the middle of Mary Graydon Center while Matt Miller believes AU merely needs more pride. And John Lancelot pledges to make AU a wet campus again.
The candidates hail from four different schools within AU, which helps explain their varying backgrounds and campaign styles. Kanneth, who has the most experience within student government, is a broadcast journalism major in the School of Communication and his candidacy reflects his strong communications skills. When I asked him about concerns over public safety, he responded that "open communication" with the administration was part of the solution. As president of Leonard Hall, he helped organize town hall meetings with the administration to address residents' concerns about issues such as broken laundry machines.
His platform rests on three issues: promoting a safer campus, reducing parking fees, and a more streamlined financial aid system. Kanneth proposes increasing the number of blue lights on campus, trimming the shrubbery around the ampitheater and holding town hall-style meetings with administration members to air out concerns about Public Safety. A strong dialogue and administrative connections are important for an SC president, but Kanneth will need to prove he can effectively stand up to the administration when important issues arise.
Gilbert is a product of the Kogod School of Business and his approach to governance runs straight out of Donald Trump's playbook. He stresses his contacts with the administration and ability to play hardball with the administration. "You need to know the art of negotiation. I know when to play nice and when to play dirty," Gilbert. He also stands out from his opponents for his willingness to incorporate the Greek community in more programming. He is running as the outsider and argued other candidates are promising pie-in-the-sky proposals that cannot be accomplished at the SC level.
Gilbert correctly identified many of the problems that AU faces: the fragmentation of the school and lack of school spirit. He is a genuinely enthusiastic candidate, and perhaps what the school needs is a self-described "gentle giant" like Gilbert. But he would need some on-the-job training - perhaps not a bad thing, considering the mixed record of the more experienced SC-insider presidents.
Mount presents an ambitious game plan and an in-depth website to promote his campaign. Still, Mount is the only candidate who has a comprehensive plan to achieve the fun and school spirit that many of his rivals promise. He pledges to work towards the creation of a full-fledged, on-campus entertainment center replete with a bowling alley, pool tables, air hockey and foosball tables.
Sadly, the plan is not very realistic. Renovation of Mary Graydon Center is not under the Student Confederation's domain and would take more than the lobbying that Mount promises to achieve this lofty goal. With a General Assembly that is increasingly conservative with the SC's purse strings, it is nearly incomprehensible that any full-fledged game center would be primarily achieved through any SC administration.
Like his Greek counterpart Gilbert, Miller does not have any experience in AU's student government. Miller is a guitar-playing history major who "loves the school" and wants to instill pride in it through election. He is involved with many different clubs on campus and said his fraternity experience was merely a supplement to his already-active campus life. One of his strongest ideas is the implementation of an off-campus Eagle Nights at club venues, such as the 9:30 club. He supports increased publicity for clubs, believing such added attention would help get students more involved in student government. Miller sounds like an ideal Eagle Nights director, but his attempted rise to the top of the student government ladder seems a bit ambitious.
John Lancelot is a physics and political science double major who transferred from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Florida two years ago. Also running as an outsider, Lancelot proposes lobbying the administration to bring alcohol back on campus for those 21 and over, and to reduce the penalties for those students caught with alcohol. He promises a more confrontational tone with the administration, and criticizes previous SC presidents for their passivity. "The [AU] administration should worry more about helping students who are attacked and assaulted than writing up students who are drinking on campus," he told me in what appears to be one of his campaign slogans.
Despite all the hoopla, students are simply electing a representative to allocate student activities funds and serve as a representative of the student body. At AU, politically-minded students get genuinely psyched during this two-week period, where students become campaign managers, speechwriters and advisers - to candidates merely running in a student election. It's certainly unique to AU and it provides its own school spirit to those interested in the process. Ultimately, a president should be chosen based on who best represents the school - and not necessarily based on the laundry-list of policies and promises candidates offer.
This upcoming weekend is your turn to decide on which candidate fits the bill.
Josh Kraushaar is a senior in the School of Public Affairs and is a contributor to www.aurepublicans.blogspot.com. E-mail the author at jk2069a@american.edu. This column appears every two weeks.
