Students on campus are often not personally involved enough in decisions that impact them.
I believe the majority of the student population is unaware of how much influence they can have on campus through their representation in ASUW. I think students should strive to know more about decisions being made on their behalf, rather than being apathetic towards them.
While I fully understand that students may believe that student government holds minimal influence in any school, that is simply not the case for ASUW.
Their focus on improving the student experience extends far beyond small-scale decisions, as they regularly work on projects that will impact students long after they themselves graduate.
For example, ASUW has recently funded a new endowment to support international and DACA students. This was one event in the past year that will have an impact on the student population for the foreseeable future.
However, their decisions can have impacts far outside the scope of the university. The recently passed “Anti-hazing Education Act” could have an impact on the entire state.
Among the many goals of this act, the ASUW members who wrote expressed their hopes that it would show the rest of the state that this anti-hazing education was a priority for them.
ASUw has expressed the hope that they will see similar education policies implemented in school systems across the state, not just those local to Laramie.
All of this is brought up to say I am upset by the amount of students who are unaware of these events and the impacts they could have.
While ASUW functions as an independent organization, its goal is still to represent us and improve our experiences on campus.
Many students who I have brought these subjects up to have been surprised to learn about them and some have even been surprised to hear that we have a student government at all.
As someone who has invested a great deal of time into learning about ASUW and researching their legislation for articles, it deeply saddens me that students are unaware of these events.
If students made themselves more involved in these subjects, I believe they could provide extremely valuable feedback to ASUW that could be beneficial for the entire campus, even if all it does is spur a discussion among its members.
Recently, a vocal student came to ASUW to present their own concerns to the senate, and this presentation spurred a very valuable debate about the mask policy on campus. While it did not cause any immediate changes, it did let ASUW know that some students had concerns that they felt were not addressed properly.
This approach is much more forward than I would expect, but it was an option that the student utilized to spur a potentially valuable discussion.
Not everyone needs to watch a two-hour meeting on the ASUW Facebook page, and not everyone needs to read my articles about them. Frankly, it is not something I would expect any student to do regularly, nor request of them.
What I do want to see from students is a greater understanding of what ASUW is, and how they can provide their feedback to them.
I truly believe ASUW wants to represent us, and I also believe students are not involving themselves enough to be represented.
What I would recommend to students is that at the very least they pay more attention to the surveys and communications sent to them by ASUW, as these are clear requests for our opinions and openings for further discussion among the student population.
A failure to respond to these requests for input is a failure to have your opinion represented at the University, and a lack of representation benefits no one.
