Hunter Swilling has been the new ASUW Vice President (VP) since late October and is dedicated to ensuring the successful continuation of the University of Wyoming’s student government.
“My primary focus is the longevity of the position and longevity of ASUW,” Swilling said. “No organization is perfect and continually improving itself I think is something that any student government, in particular, should be looking at doing.”
The transition from Senator to VP has required a period of adjustment for Swilling.
“There is a bit of a learning curve with managing our Senate and managing committees and just re-getting to know some of the stuff that I forgot during my time in the presidency,” Swilling said.
As the VP, Swilling has had to take on the tasks required by his new office.
“The primary duty and responsibility of the Vice President is to manage and liaise with our legislative branch, which is our Senate here at ASUW.”
Besides serving as a point of communication between the two branches, Swilling also chairs the Senate meetings, writes legislation, helps senators manage and track their hours, and helps them get involved with projects that they are interested in.
As VP Swilling has ideas for several changes that he hopes will be beneficial for all of ASUW and our entire student body.
“I think making some changes that reduce the amount of time that we spend in Senate meetings might be beneficial because they’re quite long. And that would save our student body money.”
Swilling also wishes to improve the committee management system and has plans to write detailed documents that address expectations, rules, and the roles of the various parts of committees.
Swilling plans on ASUW being the extent of his political career but making change at UW while he could was important for him.
“I got into ASUW because I genuinely thought that there were a lot of things at UW that needed to change, and I thought it could be an effective means of going about that.”
“I’m actually a STEM major in molecular biology and physiology and I’ll probably want to go into healthcare or research or something like that. So this is kind of it for me in like a policy or advocacy role for probably at least the rest of my life. So I thought making the change while I could is something that’s important to me.”
