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April 20, 2007 > Opinion > SA: Make us care

SA: Make us care

By The Rice Thresher Editorial Staff | Thresher Editorial Staff

The Student Association hosted a Spring Retreat Tuesday evening, and the concept was as thoughtful as the execution was thoughtless. (See story, Page 7.) SA President Laura Kelley promised a spring retreat during her campaign, and her follow-through produced a gathering of four administrators who had many ideas and university plans to share with undergraduates — it just did not bring it to students.

As is often the case with student organizations, the biggest problem was publicity. The SA relied on posters hung in residential college commons and verbal announcements at college cabinet meetings from SA Senators — some of which were never even made — to advertise the event. Less than a third of the student body received Facebook invitations to the retreat, and any listserv e-mails were ineffective at best.

The SA needs to advertise smarter. The problem is getting students to care about what is being said at events like this retreat and at weekly SA meetings. The organization will draw a larger and more interested crowd if it can grab students’ attention before meetings ever occur: By highlighting why students should care in advertisements themselves, the SA will actually grab students’ attention.

So when students complain about campus policies or procedures, the SA should listen. Then it should spend its advertising energy explaining how it can address and solve those complaints. We all know the SA exists; it is time we were better informed about what it does — besides give out T-shirts at picnics.

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