On Monday, Jan. 28, 2019, Drury’s Student Government Association (SGA) ratified its constitution and bylaws after a student body vote in favor of the revised documents.

Representatives of SGA’s Constitution Committee, Cameron Higbe and Michael Havens, presented the changes to SGA on Thursday, Jan. 17. The following week, on Thursday, Jan. 24, SGA’s General Assembly voted to approve the changes.

Students received an email from SGA on Friday, Jan. 25, with a link to to vote in an online poll. On Sunday, Jan. 27, the SGA Constitution Committee informed The Mirror that the student body had voted in favor of the updated constitution.

The new constitution contains several changes that will streamline the way SGA operates going forward, allowing the organization to better serve the student body.

Changes to the executive council

“I think the biggest change, first and foremost, is the executive council changes,” said Cameron Higbe, who is the SGA Constitution Committee Chairman and a Senior Class Senator.

For many years, SGA’s executive council has consisted of a president, seven vice presidents and a senior class president. According to the newly ratified constitution, SGA will now have only four vice president positions: Vice President of Student Life, Vice President of Institutional Affairs, Vice President of Finance and Vice President of Communication & Public Relations. The senior class president will no longer be a position.

“In the past several years, we’ve had a lot of turnover in those executive positions, and there’s constantly a seat open here and there. By condensing those positions and giving more responsibility to the senators, hopefully SGA is going to be able to get a lot more done in each of our terms. In that way, the student body is going to be served positively. All of the changes are to benefit the student body, but I think this is going to be the one that has the largest noticeable impact,” said SGA President Lexie Gutierrez.

Higbe explained that having a smaller executive council and larger senate committees allows for tasks to be more evenly distributed among all members. This is also an opportunity for senators to take on more responsibility in SGA and prepare for future roles on the executive council.

“Another benefit of condensing those positions is that right now they are seven separate seats. It’s a lot of separate work, even though there’s a lot of overlap in what they could be doing. This way, we recategorized them by grouping things that should go together, and we’ll be able to do bigger things that encompass more aspects of campus,” said Gutierrez.

Cameron Higbe presenting the updated constitution up for vote. Photo via Taylor Stanton.

Recognizing interns

SGA’s constitution now formally recognizes interns, who are representatives of the freshman class in their first semester at Drury. In the past, interns were traditional roles that allowed freshman to learn about the innerworkings of SGA, since they cannot be elected to SGA before their first semester on campus. Interns can be elected by the student body as freshman senators at the end of the fall term each school year.

“We gave a process outlining how interns are to be selected by SGA [in the revised constitution]. It [the constitution] also formally recognizes them and gives them more power than they had before, since now they can participate in procedural motions, like points of order, just not parts of business,” stated Higbe.

This revision allows interns to count their semester of experience toward their time involved in SGA. This is beneficial for them because being elected to some SGA positions requires the candidate to have served a certain amount of time within the organization. Trying to fill a seat last year sparked a debate among SGA members as to whether internship experience should count toward a year of experience on SGA.

Gutierrez expressed that this change is also an effort to increase SGA’s transparency with the student body.

“We’ve had interns for several years now, but this way we are also holding ourselves more accountable by having that process outlined and putting it out there for the whole student body to see. It just puts a little bit more transparency and makes everyone else more aware of what we are doing and what opportunities they have in our organization,” said Gutierrez.

SGA members voting on the updated constitution section by section. Photo via Taylor Stanton.

Other changes

The number of votes needed to override or amend the financial handbook has also changed from 50 percent of the General Assembly to two-thirds.

“Changing from a majority to a supermajority is, again, a system of checks and balances for ourselves,” stated Gutierrez.

Grammatical changes were also made to the constitution to make it more concise and easier to understand. The updated constitution has reshaped SGA’s organizational structure to more effectively carry out its mission.

As stated in SGA’s constitution, “The Student Government Association of Drury University is established to address the rights and concerns of the entire student body. We constantly strive to enhance the student experience within the Drury Community.”

It is SGA’s hope that these changes help the organization “enhance the student experience.”

Written by Taylor Stanton.