By Manny Loley

With Student Council election season approaching, Student Council hopes to see more students running for office. Council elections will begin on March 21 and voting will take place through OrgSync.

“There has been a lack of interest in running for student government in the past,” Student Council president Kevin Pan ’15 said.

“Certainly there have been occasions in the past, I’m thinking two or three years ago, and some seats were unfilled and there was nobody running,” Dean of Students Hank Toutain said.

Pan attributes students’ lack of interest to a lack of awareness about Student Council. “About half of the school doesn’t recognize Student Council,” Pan said.
Daniel Garcia-Archundia ’17 echoed Pan’s observation. “I have not heard of anyone wanting to run,” Garcia-Archundia said of his first-year peers.

Some ideas Student Council’s is considering to increase visibility are a poster campaign, similar to the Community Advisors posters, aimed to introduce Council members, and setting up a system to anonymously submit student concerns to the Council.

Additionally, as an initiative to make Student Council more transparent, Communications Director Alex Britt ’15 sends Student Council minutes through the student-info email network.

Student Council is still in the midst of engaging students’ interest, and there is no system set up to gauge the success rate of the Council minutes initiative. Toutain said Student Council members play a pivotal role in the politics of Kenyon.
“Most fundamentally, Student Council is a voice for students,” Toutain said. “I think the potential of students is considerable to, through Student Council, affect policy decisions and so forth here on campus.”