Beaird, SGA have big plans for semester

While most ASU students were taking a break over the summer, SGA President Ryan Beaird and Vice President Quan Poole worked tirelessly on initiatives for the upcoming school year. Their goal? To be the most proactive administration ever and to focus on the issues students care about.

"It's not about what Quan Poole wants, what [PR Director] Kyle Fulton wants, or what Ryan Beaird wants," Poole said, "It's what the students want, because if we get in there and just do our own thing, we're really not benefiting anybody."

Beaird and Poole have enough student-focused ideas to fill a book, beginning with Welcome Week and a voter registration drive that started today. With the weeklong voter registration drive, Beaird and Poole hope to stoke student interest in this year's Presidential election, which they will follow up with an election night watch party on Nov. 4.

Another focus for the new administration is their newly established campus-recycling program. ASU launched the program last spring under Beard's initiative and set up plastic recycling bins all over campus. However, Beaird and Poole hope to expand the program this year to include much more than just plastic.

"We've got some designs and some ideas of some permanent structures of recycling bins-ones for aluminum, ones for compost waste, newspapers, the whole nine yards," Beaird said.

Poole explained that some of the previously set up bins have not been working out because students put trash other than plastic in them. He hopes that by developing a more defined system with separate bins for different materials, students will no longer mistake the recycling bins for trashcans.

Beaird and Poole also have plans of setting up what they call, "Campus Hall Meetings" to promote communication between students, the SGA, and University administration. They hope to have one meeting each semester in which students directly voice their questions and opinions to those who can do something about them. Poole said the "Campus Hall Meetings" are a way for he and other SGA officials to "actually be held accountable" to the students who elected them.

Another event in the works is a series called "Around the World" that will showcase different countries from which ASU has international students. Starting in September, the SGA plans to hold special events, such as authentic meals and speakers, to celebrate a different country each month. Beaird hopes the events will be informative for the whole student body but especially welcoming to international students.

In addition, the SGA is working to promote ASU's new Red Wolves mascot as much as possible. For this year's Centennial Celebration, they plan to purchase a Red Wolves monument similar to "Clyde," which was purchased at ASU's 50th anniversary and is on display in the Student Union.

They are also working on an initiative to honor a "Red Wolves family" during one of this season's home football games. The "Red Wolves family" will be a family committed to ASU and who diligently helps their children achieve success while in college.

Furthermore, Beaird and Poole are doing everything in their power to turn one dreamt-about event into reality: a Red Wolves vs. Razorback football game. The new president and vice president have been in contact with state legislators and the University of Arkansas SGA and are passionate about seeing this game, one day, take place. They admit that if achieved, it could take several years to happen, but Beaird and Poole at least hope to get the ball rolling in that direction.

Even if Beaird and Poole are able to carry out all of their plans and ideas, they don't want their accomplishments to end at the close of the school year. They said that their hope is to set a precedent for future SGA administrations, to raise the bar high, and to increase productivity for every SGA staff to come.