By Jonathan Smith, Editor in Chief

The Students’ Association’s search for an executive secretary crossed oceans and international borders before ending with a selection late last week.

Executive officers selected Matt Worthington, sophomore English major from San Antonio who currently is studying abroad in Oxford, as next year’s secretary. Worthington will join president Maher Saab, vice president Jordan Williams and treasurer Tyler Cosgrove on the executive cabinet of SA, and he said he is already looking forward to the job.

“I really like working with people and in the job of SA secretary, you not only get to work alongside some very hardworking people within the SA office and within Congress, but you also get to spend time with some equally hardworking individuals and organizations,” Worthington said in an e-mail.

As secretary, Worthington will spend at least 20 hours a week in the SA office, mainly at the front desk, talking with people who come in the office, answering the phone, scheduling meetings and carrying out tasks for the other executive officers. Saab said Worthington’s personality made him a good fit for the position.

“He’ll be a really good personable face and good personable attitude that will be the first face you see when you walk in the SA door,” Saab said.

Worthington echoed that excitement about being, in many respects, the face of SA.

“I really like to see what people are about, be it the vision they have for their organization, their life story or what they want to do with their lives,” Worthington said, “and as SA secretary, you’re bound to encounter a slice of that every time someone walks into the office since you’re the first person they see.”

Worthington served on Congress in the fall as a Smith Hall representative but didn’t this semester while he was studying abroad in England -something that he said has made preparing for his new job difficult.

“Being 5,000 miles away, it’s been an obstacle trying to become familiar with [the executive officers’] visions and ideas, but as I’ve been discussing with them lately and I’m gradually relayed bits of information, I’m beginning to overcome all of that,” he said.

Worthington said he looks forward to being in a position to communicate with students and student groups on campus. He already has begun considering possibilities for increasing and encouraging communication with students and Congress.

“I feel like communicating is my natural gift-it’s definitely my passion,” Worthington said. “The job of SA secretary is a venue in which I get to communicate with all kinds of people, and when I get to do what I love doing as a job, that makes it even better.”