Seema Pai and John Naheedy, the Blue Party candidates for LSA Student Government President and VP, have been two of the most successful and approachable members of LSA-SG over the last few years.
Working on student government and around campus, we developed a vision for MSA and LSA-SG which emphasizes empowerment, enthusiasm and service. The Blue Party is committed to providing services and completing projects that make student life a little bit cheaper or easier. We tend to eschew lofty campaign promises in favor of promoting realistic goals that we can accomplish in the next year and which will have a positive, tangible effect on students' lives.
We have four major goals for next year's student government:
- This year saw the test-run of the Student Coursepack Service. We provided at-cost coursepacks to students in selected classes, saving them between $8 and $30 a coursepack.
The test has been successful, and next year we plan to lead MSA in institutionalizing and expanding the SCS to serve thousands of students instead of a few hundred.
- Defending students, both from the Code of Student Conduct and from the University and city policies which unduly harm independent student communities. Whether you're Greek (like Andy) or not (like Bram), it's hard to ignore the special attention that the Greek system received from the University and local law enforcement this year.
The same goes for students of color, whose Union events are watched with disproportionate scrutiny by security. We want to address the policies which infringe on the daily life of any student community.
- Working towards some form of student representation on the University Board of Regents. We have been on this fight since we first joined MSA, and we've grown up a lot since then: where we used to aim for the creation of an elected student regent and curse the heavens when it sounds boring. It is boring.
But it's important, and the Blue Party has the most experience on this issue and will, we hope, be able to deliver some small gains next year.
- Instituting direct constituency on MSA, so that every student on campus gets one MSA rep to whom they can address questions and complaints about University life. This is a big departure from MSA's current at-large system; political theoreticians and constitutional scholars love this plan. We love it because it means that MSA will ask you for advice all year long, not just during elections.
We don't bring big promises to the table. As president and vice president, we want to engender the enthusiasm for working on student services which comes from growing your own ideas into functioning services, not from being handed part of someone else's campaign platform. Blue candidates have brilliant, realistic ideas - ASL course that fulfill the language requirement, defaulting campus printers to double-sided copies, more restaurants in Pierpont commons, grassroots lobbying for concerned students instead of embarrassing sententious resolutions about national affairs, reforming the residence hall meal credit system, better campus lighting, improving the CCRB, expanding the new Academic Minors system, at-cost copies for students and on and on.
Vote for the Blue Part and watch these ideas bloom.
This election is about differences in attitude more than differences in policy ideas. The Blue Party has fun doing the often tedious work of student government. When you vote today or tomorrow, help us out. Go Blue.
- Bram Elias can be reached over e-mail at btelias@umich.edu and Andy Coulouris can be reached at acoulour@umich.edu.
03-24-99
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