Student Government Carries on Despite
Lack of Support
Bill Cotter
Associate Editor
Members of Link Crew were recently invited to sit in
on a Student Government meeting featuring Principal Lynne Erdle and
Assistant Principal Vern
Tenney.
While the meeting allowed for students to express their concerns, ranging
from toilet paper deficiencies to Spring Fling, only a few students,
including Student Government members, offered suggestions.
Recently, the club has faced dwindling support from the student population.
Most students can surmise the role of Knitting Club or Robotics Club.
But, students wonder, does Student Government actually govern?
President Zach Dallmeyer-Drennen suggests that “One of our main
things we do is that we send members to leadership conferences…we
usually spend some time doing community service activities. A lot of
our time is spent planning activities like Homecoming.” Advisor
Roberta Bittel believes the role of Student Government “is to
be the voice of the students, to provide and promote activities for
those kids.”
“
Some years are better than others,” she says. “It just
depends on who the leaders are.” While the National Association
of Student Councils mandates certain standards that must be followed,
the actual success of the club ultimately comes down to student participation
and leadership.
Currently, “our meetings are not very organized,” says
Senior Katie Wilbur. “We don’t really have committees
to work on projects, so we end up doing a lot of that work during
our meetings.”
Dallmeyer-Drennen admits also that “as a student organization,
it’s really difficult to go about accomplishing a lot, because
we’re called Student Government, but we have very limited
power within the school.”
According to Erdle, this is due to “a variety of legal, safety
and/or logistical issues.” For example, she displayed skepticism
on a proposal to allow all students to access e-mail accounts at
school, instead favoring the possibility of school-designated e-mail
accounts.
Issues like these have resulted in dwindling numbers. “I
wish there was a way that we could encourage all 1400 students
to participate in some way in our school culture,” says Erdle.
The members “do a great job representing those students who
they know. I just fear that we continue to leave out other students
who then have no voice.”
Senior Cara Gelinas, a Student Government member, believes that “Student
Government is currently headed in the wrong direction, and by that
I mean that there just aren’t as many students that want
to participate in the meetings and events.” To combat this,
the club has attempted to draw from groups like Link Crew.
Though administration is optimistic, students are not taking the
bait. Senior Liz Riedman, who attended meetings as a Sophomore,
stopped coming because “there weren’t many important
issues,” and “my being there wasn’t contributing
much to the group.”
Juniors Diana Glattly and Derek Goh never considered joining Student
Government. Glattly is “dissatisfied with the current leadership,” and
Goh did not win as a fifth grader, and that “pretty much
killed my hopes.”
Currently, Student Government is attempting to push some new plans,
including a re-write of its Constitution, the e-mail proposal,
and an attempt to make the cafeteria more environmentally friendly.
But first they have to convince the student population that, for
once, their voices just might be heard. Return
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