The YOUniversity Party will be running on six key issues including a financial policy, student services, academics, student organizations, market successes of UTM and transparency.
The YOUniversity Party aims to safeguard against student fees and provide financial transparency. They hope to “work closely with the UT Board of Trustees to prevent unnecessary fee increases, work to lower or change the Student Publication Fee into something beneficial to all students as most publications are electronically produced and revisit the Student Teaching Fee that the 61st General Assembly tried to defund.”
The YOUniversity Party will also “work to assure the next assembly continue to stay under budget as all recently past assemblies have done.”
The YOUniversity Party plans to work with Dining Services by continuing “to work closely with Sodexo and dining services to provide better quality and a more enjoyable dining experience on campus for students.” They will work for campus beautification by continuing “to uphold the precedent set by past assemblies of supporting forms of renovation to campus aesthetics and to push for the UTM themed flower bed to be planted in front of the Dunagen Alumni Center that was passed in legislation by the 62nd General Assembly.”
The YOUniversity Party also hopes to work with athletics by working to “continue the Athletic Liaison position within SGA, improve the relationship between the Department of Athletics and SGA by coordinating events together, such as UTM Appreciation Day and whiteout games and work with the Department of Athletics to increase team performance and student participation in Athletic events and games.”
The YOUniversity Party plans to “support all programs done by RAs for residents, along with services such as Residence Hall Tutoring on campus and work to increase participation in these events and programs hosted by the Department of Housing.”
The YOUniversity Party also plans to focus on academics with a look at registration, advising, grade appeal and academic quality. The party plans to “support earned hours based on registration and encourage professors to solve individual registration issues and research the benefits and downfalls of priority registration for those students requiring it.” The party says it will “work with the Faculty Senate to improve the quality of advising in an effort to increase the UTM retention rate for students.”
They also plan to “establish a grade appeal process for students who believe their final grade has been recorded incorrectly to be approved by the University Council, Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs and Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs and pursue ways to improve students’ academic rights.”
The party also hopes to improve academic quality by working “to increase the campus overall GPA through implementing and supporting pre-existing programs, such as the Student Success Center” and by hosting and sponsoring “a convention for student research presentations.”
The YOUniversity Party also says they plan to increase student engagement in organizations by encouraging “student organizations to continue their successes, but to also extend their events to the weekends in an effort to have more events for students who do not travel home and support of President’s Roundtable, Diversity Week, the Office of Multicultural Affairs and international student exchange and student organizations to participate and involvement in Athletic games and events.”
The party also plans to focus on market successes through supporting “campus conservation and policies that improve efficiency and ultimately save university resources in order to put more resources towards programs that improve overall campus success, showcase undergraduate research by hosting and sponsoring an undergraduate research presentation conference” and by working “with our state government to promote support for higher education throughout the state, but especially at UTM.”
Finally, the YOUniversity Party plans to increase transparency at all levels. At the Legislative Branch, they plan to “hold all members accountable through the Judicial Branch, work to make senators more personable and visual on campus by hosting more SGA sponsored events” and make contacting senators “easier through social media.”
At the Executive Branch, the party hopes to “hold all member accountable by the Judicial Branch and the student body and post videos periodically updating the student body on the State of the Campus and SGA business.” At the Judicial Branch, the party says it will “hold all member accountable through Executive and Legislative Branches and work to maintain that the Student Court remains unbiased in all circumstances.”
The executive council for the YOUniversity party includes Bryan Swayze for president, Sean O’Brien for vice president and Elizabeth Packard for secretary general.
