MSA looks to fill standing committee student positions
President Jordan Paul hopes to make more logical matches.
Published July 8, 2009
As of Aug. 31, student terms for MU standing committees, which are appointed by the chancellor, will end and students will have the option to renew, quit or be reassigned to something else.
All student terms on standing committees are one year, while most faculty and staff positions are three years.
"One of the biggest problems we have is there is no consistency," Missouri Students Association President Jordan Paul said.
Paul is working to find the right student to fill each position, whom he will later officially submit for approval.
To curb the inconsistency, Paul offered anyone who actively served on a committee the option to continue serving.
"They have more institutional knowledge, and they're more skilled," Paul said of student committee members as opposed to students who haven't served.
In addition, Paul said the MSA is no longer using the old method of passing around a clipboard and hoping people sign up for something they have knowledge and interest in, as was done before former MSA President Jim Kelley.
Students are now matched as closely as possible with their MSA committees based on specialties, knowledge or experience.
"We went out of our way to include people who had interest and combine leadership from outside of MSA," he said. "We tried to open up the doors as much as possible for those who are interested, but maybe not members of MSA."
For example, Paul asked members from the Student Court to serve on committees such as Traffic Appeals and Student Conduct.
Paul estimated he has about 10 positions left to fill, but he started with dozens.
The Persons with Disabilities, Library and Financial Aid committees are lacking possible student representatives, but Paul said the rest are shaping up.
Of the 31 committees, students have representation on 26 of them, and many committees have positions for more than one student representative.
Paul said he was surprised by his progress.
He said he plans to document where he puts everyone, and who fit well in each committee.
"I think we've been more conscious about it than people have in the past, and we're documenting it," Paul said.
In addition, Paul said he would encourage students to add information to the standing committee binders introduced by past MSA President Rachel Anderson. He said he hopes this will allow for an easy flow of information and institutional knowledge between old and new committee members.
Paul said how effectively this student representation is utilized varies from committee to committee. Factors, such as the frequency of committee meetings, also play a role in their effectiveness. He said some committees are not even called during a student's term, while others might meet as often as every two weeks.
Paul said in his experience, the faculty has taken student perspective into consideration by asking questions of students and factoring in their opinions.