Students’ Association President Jeremy Smith came up with a solution to budget squabbling. But the solution was unconstitutional by his own admission.
Yet he went ahead and said it anyway, offering Congress an opportunity to violate SA’s governing document.
Such an action mirrors Smith’s action in presenting his bold new proposal to Congress. It may have good intentions, but it is just not thought out.
Smith admitted he has not resolved issues dealing with the SA retreat, International Justice Mission or Freshman Action Council under his new plan.
Nor does he know how to completely reconcile class officers’ desires to plan activities with his desire that they work solely on advocacy.
This proposal, which has been hyped for about a week, boils down to Smith wanting to give SA a credible voice of a unified student body.
These are fantastic intentions, but Smith couldn’t answer a question in Wednesday’s meeting about which particular administration official had confided that the university doesn’t trust or believe in SA.
Smith’s examples are misinformed. The administration held off on block tuition in part because of negative student reaction.
Block tuition is inevitable here, yes. But according to Vicki Anderson, who is in charge of the university’s block tuition matters, block tuition is a nationwide trend that ACU will have to join, regardless of how unified SA is.
SA had a point being upset about lack of administrative communication during the reallocation process. But the president himself has said the university should have done better.
As it stands now, Smith’s plan is opposed by nearly every class officer and several influential committee chairs. The plan isn’t bad, but it will fail unless Smith can convince Congress it’s worth doing.
And advocating the violation of the Constitution in order to keep pushing this proposal late Wednesday certainly wasn’t a good start.