By Laura Acuff, Opinion Editor

With increased student participation as a goal of this year’s Summit, the Student Track received a facelift this year, said Brady Bryce, director of Ministry Events.

“How it’s been done differently is I feel like we’ve really involved students even better this year-really taken their ideas and run with them,” Bryce said. “I think the greater student involvement in the planning is going to show up. For this past year, we involved student leaders. We tapped the shoulders of different people and said, ‘OK, who are leaders on campus? Who would be good to involve?'”

While in the future, Bryce said even more student input may be sought in an effort to increase student input in planning Summit this year, an ACU Student Planning Team offered feedback on ways to engage students.

The team included students of a variety of classifications and backgrounds. The team began meeting last semester to discuss topics and speakers that would interest students, said teammember Crystal Chavez, sophomore elementary education major from San Antonio. Chavez said student input has a valuable place in Summit planning.

“I think it’s very important,” she said. “A lot of the students have to go to Lectureship anyways or go for their Chapel credits, and it should be something that they’re interested in.”

Prior commitments to other activities, school or just general fatigue may contribute to students’ lack of interest in Summit, Chavez said. But, she said attending is worthwhile regardless.

“I’d say to go and listen and really be interested in what these people have to say because some of these people are really well-known authors and such, and they have interesting ideas and points,” Chavez said.

Bryce said refocusing Summit on the students is part of a general movement to return the annual conference to its roots.

“From a deeper perspective, back when this thing started, it was all about students and it was focused in on students,” Bryce said. “Here is a chance, whatever your discipline, to engage faith and life together in a place where faculty and students are presenting and sitting by one another, and church leaders are on campus, as well as Christianity at large.”

Although Bryce said he hopes student involvement in the choosing of topics and speakers for this year’s student track and scheduling all student track sessions in the afternoon will encourage and enable more students to attend. In the end, he said student participation is up to the students, and he has considered the possibility that efforts to involve students may come up short.

“I think I’d be disappointed and I’d be surprised because I really feel like they’re going to be involved,” Bryce said. “If it doesn’t meet my expectations, it just means we look at it again and say, ‘All right, what could this be? Let’s dream all over again and plan for 2009.'”