A small crowd attends Student Senate debate where a wide variety of topics are discussed

Last Wednesday evening all candidates for Student Senate office gathered in Myers Auditorium for a debate.

The debate was somewhat informal with candidates often exceeding their time allowed, and confusion as to who went first.

Apart from it’s lack of structure, the debate went well, and all candidates were given ample time to state their qualifications.

The debate between presidential candidates was first and began with the moderator asking questions, and then each potential president had three minutes to state their view.

The biggest topic at hand was how the president will interact with the on campus organizations.

Junior Dave Roche planned a Board of Student Organizations in which all clubs would send a representative to speak with the senate. Junior Mackenzie Wrobel intends to create a “Big 10”, and she will meet with the 10 largest groups on campus.

Junior Machenzie Wrobel proposes a "Big 10" plan during the Student Senate Debate on Wednesday, March 18. Photo by David Lu.

After the debate portion, the candidates fielded questions from the somewhat sparse audience.

Most questions were somewhat ignorant in that the asker was rephrasing a topic already covered.

Other questions were downright confusing and appeared to be ploys to stump the candidate opposite of their support.

Other offices up for debate included; Vice President, Corresponding Secretary, Treasurer and Recording Secretary.

These debates were done according to the same format the presidential debate was.

The Vice Presidential debate went quickly, both candidates displayed knowledge of the topics. Juniors Dan Aiello and Mike Collins both expressed a desire to walk around the campus and ask students about their concerns.

The debate for Corresponding Secretary featured a great deal of talk about Student Senate’s lack of diversity, and how the candidates will improve the number of minority members.

The position constitutionally is that the elected corresponds with all organizations on campus; one candidate plainly stated to do just that, seek out every organization, including the diverse groups.

Freshman Sarah Darling, sophomore Brandy Jackson, and Ruth Simeon are all running.

Following this debate, much of the audience left the event, leaving student senate members, and a small number of concerned students.

The Treasurer and Recording Secretary ran unopposed, but both candidates seemed more than capable of completing the task required.

Overall, each candidate had displayed extreme eloquence and had ideas that will nonetheless, help Millersville in it’s quest to be a more unified campus.