ASUW President Elect Brian Schueler is early. He’s sitting just outside of the Union, waiting for one of his last interviews before being sworn in. He seems prepared, and eager to talk about the future, both understandable traits for the future leader of the UW student body.
Schueler is no stranger to the world of student government, and said he has always been attracted to the institution.
“I’ve been doing student government for a long time,” Schueler said. “I was in student government in middle school, in high school and I think initially you don’t join middle school student government because you’re like ‘I understand what I want to do with my life.’ But, it’s been something where, especially getting into high school, where there’s a little more freedom than in middle school, I was really liking being able to make a difference for my fellow students.”
Schueler said there are several steps he plans to take once in office that will make such a difference.
“Plus-minus is one part of an overarching idea that I have,” he said. “I think that ASUW has been doing a lot of good work, but maybe has been a little more timid than they should be when it comes to really putting themselves in the issues that affect students. I think that ASUW needs to be a heck of a lot more involved in the faculty senate. That’s where a lot of decisions get made.”
In spite of the range of issues Schueler plans to take on, he is concerned the election process may have made him seem singularly focused.
“I think one of the problems that you see in a campaign is that for people to remember you, you kind of have to latch on to a couple issues,” Schueler said. “If I were to give someone a governmental priorities booklet that’s three pages long, they don’t get a message.”
Josh Messer, a UW senior and ASUW’s outgoing senate president pro tempore, said he also noticed similar problems during the election.
“I know that Brian’s a very deep-thinking, insightful individual, which is hard to bear out in campaigns,” Messer said. “No one cares about ‘deep-thinking’ and ‘insightful,’ they care about what you’re going to do for him.”
Messer said he was a strong supporter for Schueler during his campaign, having known him for several years.
“Brian and I met when we were freshman many moons ago,” Messer said. “Brian was a freshman senator and I, through some loopholes, was a member of the full senate. I got to meet all of the freshman senators that year, Brian being one of them, and he was always one of the more thoughtful and more involved.”
Messer is not the only one applauding Schueler. Tyler Wolfgang, a UW sophomore and an incoming ASUW senator for the College of Education, also levied praise for the election winners.
“It’s hard to figure out his political views,” Wolfgang said. “He’s very divided and that’s what I like about him.”
Schueler may bring in more legislation than expected. He said he would also consider platforms established by his opponents during the election.
“I know Natawsha Mitchell is moving on, she won’t be involved as much with ASUW, not in an executive position,” Schueler said. “But, she actually had a lot of good insights that we plan on working with a little bit. Potentially looking at the way UW does reporting of sexual assault, racial issues, hate speech, those sorts of things.”
