MOORHEAD – The Student Government Association (SGA) is filling open positions in preparation for the next term. With applications in, interviews will be under way in the coming weeks.
The first positions to be filled were student body president, vice president and class representatives. These roles were voted upon by the student body in Feb. and resulted in junior Grace Halvorson and senior Daniel Davies winning student body president and vice president, respectively.
Voter turnout this year was 48%, which was triple the number of students from three years ago, according to current student body president, junior Jesus Gonzalez.
The roles of sophomore and junior representatives for next year have not yet been filled. Since elections have passed, these roles will be appointed after an interview process with the Student Government License and Credentials Council.
After elections, executive positions were the next to be filled. Students submitted applications and went through an interview process with the SGA staff advisor, Nathalie Reinhart, in addition to Halvorson and Davies.
The process is then moved to the Elections and Credentials Council (ECC) who made the final hiring decision, after considering the thoughts of the president and vice president elect, Halvorson said.
Halvorson and Davies have been interviewing candidates remotely from D.C. This year, there were an estimated 8 people to interview, a number Davies was “happy with.”
“(It’s) hard to submit recommendations because when you have so many very well qualified students that are really passionate about getting involved on campus and getting integrated into these roles, it’s hard to say we highly recommend this person when there are so many amazingly talented students,” Davies said.
The three executive positions have been filled, and were announced at the student senate on Thursday, March 21. Next year’s chief of staff is Jacob Schoenborn, director of communications is Rachel Huynh and chief of operations is Milton Hillegass.
Additional open positions are the advocate positions, including civic engagement, diversity and mental health advocates. Student involvement council (SIC), programs and events (P&E) and ECC commissioner applications are also being reviewed, according to SGA’s Instagram ad.
“From what I’ve seen, we have received less (applications), but the quality of the candidates that we received this year was pretty good… they’re all really motivated and excited,” Gonzalez said.
Applications for advocacy positions closed on Thursday, March 21. ECC oversees hiring for the positions in addition to running elections. They follow a set of rules and procedures, taking recommendations from the president and vice president elect when hiring for executive positions. Some decisions are reviewed by the student senate and voted upon. This year, they have two weeks to make decisions on advocacy applicants.
Each position on SGA is a paid one-year term, and students wishing to keep their roles must run again or re-apply. Terms start on April 1 for the 2024-25 school year, but most work is done during the academic year.
Roles that have not been filled will be announced at the end of the decision-making process and applications will open again either before the end of the school year or in the fall. Additional roles such as the international student representative, the student athlete (SAC) representative and the residence life (res-life) representative are appointed by the global learning office, the athletics department and the res-life office, respectively.
“I think we’ve really seen a lot of success and are really happy with a lot of people who’ve applied to our roles,” Davies said.
