The presidential and vice presidential candidates for the Associated Students of Wyoming (ASUW) gathered in the Union Ballroom on Wednesday, April 5, for a debate led by VP of Diversity of Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Zebadiah Hall. Four pairs were present, and each had two minutes to answer the six questions Hall asked, then a minute for other candidates to respond.
Before the questions began, each pair had the opportunity to introduce themselves and their campaign.
Senators Allison Grimm and Anna Lojka announced their plan to help make the campus more sustainable and accessible. Grimm is running for president with Lojka as her VP.
Next came presidential candidate Rhiannon Mclean and her running mate Tanner Ewalt who discussed their advocacy, community, and transparency plan or “ACT.”
Presidential candidate Kameron Murfit and VP hopeful Issac Almenjo-Ponce are running a similar campaign of “access, ability, and academics.”
Rounding out the introductions were Saber Smith and Jessica Petri, who are running on the slogan “ASUW sucks, let’s fix it.” Smith is on the ballot as a presidential nominee, with Petri as his VP.
Hall opened with the first question of, “How would you explain what ASUW is and what we do to a student who’s never heard of us?”
Smith answered first, saying, “It serves a student populace with over a million dollars in [its] budget, including endowments of over several millions of dollars. Now, this comes with a lot of power and responsibility for the students with internal spending and such things.”
Murfit and Ewalt both expressed that ASUW works to formulate student opinions to bring to the Board of Trustees, with Grimm adding she hopes people can see how much ASUW does.
“I ran into a friend, and she asked me, ‘So what does ASUW do besides hand out pizza?’ That broke my heart because I realized she had no idea what we did,” Grimm said. “I told her that ASUW is meant to stand up for students who are genuinely on the ground every day seeing firsthand issues with the university that need to be addressed by the administration and the Board of Trustees.”
Hall’s next question asked candidates what they see as ASUW’s strengths and weaknesses.
Alemjo-Ponce answered first, saying a weakness of the student government was students’ lack of familiarity with it.
“Emails can only get so far, and we hope that we could kind of enlighten our senators to go out into the student organizations and try and bolster that kind of activity with our students,” Alemjo-Ponce said.
McLean added that ASUW’s strengths include its ability to tackle special projects, noting an initiative she was a part of that distributed anti-date rape kits.
“Every day, students are talking about how much they love that,” she said.
Grimm echoed similar sentiments, pointing out that there are a variety of student organizations ASUW has the chance to support.
Smith had a different tone towards ASUW, telling audience members, “I have been on ASUW for three years, and I’ve never felt it to be a home. I always go in and feel like another number in the bureaucracy. I think what we need to prioritize, whoever is the next upcoming administration is walking up to people and asking how they’re doing.”
Next, Hall asked what the candidates would do to serve the students at UW better.
Grimm used her time to propose her plan to connect with students by tabling in The Union and attending student-led events.
Smith hopes to reach students in non-traditional ways, saying, “Something that I found impactful this year is working with the ethics club for Spark Change. I love the idea of helping and giving back to the community.”
Murfitt added, “Yeah, I would also like to add that I agree with everyone here. They have all done so many wonderful projects in the past in ASUW, and I foresee them doing so many more wonderful projects in their future time here.”
Hall then asked how candidates would support student organizations apart from traditional funding.
“People don’t want to come to talk to us,” Grimm answered, “and because of that, we don’t often get perspectives of different student organizations or just students in general. So I think meeting student organizations at where they’re up is probably one of the most important things.”
Petri discussed how she wants to communicate with students and make sure they know where to go when it comes to funding.
Alemjo-Ponce echoed similar thoughts.
“Making sure that we can get senators out there and into these organizations to make that first contact to let them know we’re here to help you with whatever you might need, whether that be funding, whether that be directions or ideas. We’re here for you.” Alemjo-Ponce said.
Ewalt shared the need to increase members overall.
“What we found the biggest issue for student [organizations] post-COVID is getting members. It’s not that the members don’t exist. It’s not that the community isn’t here on campus. It’s just getting those people into those orgs, getting those students involved.” Ewalt said.
Hall then asked how candidates would address DEI on campus.
Petri expressed the need for ASUW to acknowledge the diversity on campus and consider these different groups when enacting change.
“We have rigorous intersectionality when it comes to identities on campus because the student doesn’t just fall into one category. And that won’t ever just be the one identity that they have.” Petri said.
“We are a pretty diverse campus with different minority minorities, international students, nontraditional, identity-based political ideology base and all of that. And if we can come together to unify members together, we could make this campus really great for students and even for staff and faculty,” Murfitt added.
“Diversity is part of advocacy. It is part of the community, and it is part of transparency and making sure that different groups of all different kinds get reached,” McLean said, who is part of the first openly queer ticket in UW history.
Grimm, however, took it from a different standpoint, focusing more on disabilities than minority groups.
“As a disabled woman, there have been a lot of times where me and other people in the community didn’t quite feel included,” Grimm said. “And I agree that diversity isn’t just something we should focus on. It’s something we should incorporate into everything we’re doing whenever we pass legislation.”
Hall’s final question asked how each candidate imagined UW looking on the final day of their administration.
“I would just say that I would like to look back at my administration and know that I’ve done something to change the campus for the better,” Murfitt said.
McLean added, “I hope that whoever wins will create an administration where students can leave that experience feeling better about themselves and can leave that experience feeling prepared for professional life.”
Grimm, however, wanted to leave her mark on the campus.
“I would hope that people would remember what we’ve done,” Grimm said. “I believe right now, if we were to go up to any student, most of them probably wouldn’t be able to tell you what we do. And I want to be able to tangibly see a change in that by the end of our administration.”
Smith took a different tone, hoping that the end of his administration would be something worth celebrating.
“I want the administration to look like at the end of the year is similar to winning [the] Super Bowl,” Smith said. “That last senate meeting, it’s like the last stretch, and everyone’s excited and happy because we know we did great things.”
