Voting to decide whether to change the name of SGA to Oklahoma State Student Association begins Tuesday and ends Wednesday at 5 p.m.
The proposal’s authors say the change would improve student participation in the organization, thereby increasing student representation. To us, the change seems counterintuitive and counterproductive.
First, taking the “government” out of the Student Government Association might be disingenuous. SGA has three branches: an executive, legislative and judicial. Its officials are elected to represent us. Its bylaws, as well as its policies and procedures, mirror federal and state government models.
Why not call a spade a spade, so to speak? It’s a government.
Michael Warren, SGA president and one of the principal backers of the proposal, has said he would like to see the change as a way to remove or lessen “politics” in the organization.
But the system as it is organized is inherently political — how would the name change have an effect?
Secondly, what is in a name? It seems semantics is not going to solve the fundamental problem of apathy that cuts deeper than whether people are intimidated or dissuaded from participating by the word “government.”
It is noble to fight this apathy, but changing the name of something is unlikely to have much effect.
And how much can the seeming lack of participation in SGA be attributed to apathy?
In the marketplace of ideas on campus, SGA is just not making the cut for the majority of students. Among school, work, clubs, church and hobbies, it seems as if today’s students have to divide their time considerably.
On Wednesday, Warren will tell O’Collegian readers why he thinks the name of SGA should be changed. We encourage students still uncertain to reserve their judgment on this issue until they have the opportunity to read his guest column.
—The Daily O’Collegian
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