Posts Tagged ‘Luke Chiddix’
ASG hosts campus debate for future president
Written by Bulletin Staff
Thursday, 07 April 2011 12:56
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About 25 students attended Associate Student Government’s president and vice president debate Monday afternoon outside of the Center of Student Involvement.

Two candidate teams participated in the debate. Ashley Vogts, junior integrated studies and pre-occupational therapy major and Jennifer Cheray, junior marketing major, are running for president and vice president, respectively. Laura Bosiljevac, sophomore political science major, and Michael Stauffer，sophomore speech and theater major, are also running for president and vice president, respectively.

“I think both teams put forth a lot of effort, and they communicate their ideas very well,” said Ross Rundell, junior theatre major.

Luke Chiddix, junior political science major, said the debate had an overall good turnout, but he wished more students had been involved.

The debate started with opening statements and then candidates answered nine questions from the audience. The first question asked what the major issues are for the student body.

Vogts thought students’ voices were lost sometimes and they want to “put students back in ESU, and make their voices be heard.”

“Most organizations don’t really know what ASG can offer them,” Cheray said.

Stauffer also said he was surprised to find that people do not know about ASG and student organizations do not know who their senators were.

“Something we also believe is a huge issue on campus can just be stated with one word – apathy,” Bosiljevac said.

Candidates also answered a few questions concerning improvement on ASG and the relationship between Recognized Student Organizations and their senators.

“ASG’s foundation right now is great,” Vogts said. “We want to take those positions that they set up last year in the fall, Multicultural Affairs liaison and International liaison, (and) utilize those and make them the best they can possibly be.”

Bosiljevac said they would focus on specific training for student senators and raising the standard of the student Senate.

“We will focus on each individual senator’s strength and tailor that to fit the RSOs’ needs,” Bosiljevac said. “We want to help them use their strength to benefit their RSOs to their fullest potential as well as grow themselves.”

To better utilize the potential of senators, Stauffer said when organizing a campus event, senators could talk to related RSOs that have knowledge on the subject and get the information back to ASG to make the event more successful.

To improve the relationship between senators and RSOs, both Bosiljevac and Vogts agreed that ASG should become more approachable and utilize more cross-programming to encourage joint efforts from different organizations.

“(Cross-programming) not only will help the campus as a whole because we have greater interaction within the members on campus, but also we will have better recruitment, better retention, (and) better involvement from students,” Vogts said.

Another question was asked about the benefits of bridging the communication between faculty and students. Bosiljevac said it is not always true that faculty know everything on campus.

“We can bridge the gap and facilitate the communication…we want to get to the point where it is not just us bringing the problem to administrators and faculties,” Bosiljevac said. “We are empowering other students to go to them because their message might be different than what we might bring.”

The debate ended with the candidates’ restatement of their goals. Bosiljevac said she and Stauffer aim to “connect, communicate and accomplish” to accommodate the wants of the student body.

“Our platform is to establish, solidify and unite,” Vogts said, “Establish face-to-face interaction between organizations and senators, solidify is to build upon the structure that has already been started and reform the positions already in ASG – we want to unite the campus as a whole, especially the students with faculty members.”

 
Debate for ‘Big First’ held on campus
Written by Bulletin Staff
Thursday, 30 September 2010 16:00
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On Monday, two candidates running for a seat in Congress for the First District of Kansas attended a forum held at Emporia State University. Tim Huelskamp (R-Fowler) and Alan Jilka (D-Salina), addressed issues ranging from health care, the economy, schools and immigration. Libertarian candidate Jack Warner was invited to the forum, but couldn’t attend due to a scheduling conflict.

Candidates were not given prior notice to exactly what questions were going to be asked at the debate. Questions were selected from students and residents across Kansas. Jilka wasted little time going after Huelskamp and his policies. On several occasions, Jilka would touch on the previous issues that he felt Huelskamp had mistaken.

“(Helskamp) is a man that has been in office for years, and has never had anything pass in terms of legislation,” Jilka said after the debate. “I think there is something to be said for someone that won’t do a debate style forum, which is what we would have liked.”

Jilka also called his opponent a representative on the extremist fringe.

“At some point in time, and I think it’s quite a while ago for him, you cross the line from conservative into extreme and radical,” Jilka said during the debate.
Huelskamp said after the debate that it was an attempt to distract voters from his policies on health care and immigration.

Huelskamp was reserved for much of the evening in his responses and towards the comments made by Jilka. Throughout the contest, Jilka remained aggressive, but wasn‘t always as clear with his words. Huelskamp on the other hand decided to use more of a populist, “We the People” approach to the debate.

“(Jilka) wants to raise taxes in a time where the debt is already $1.8 trillion which is going to fall on the next generation to pay off,”Huelskampsaid during the debate. “This should be very concerning to college students especially.”

According to recent polls, Huelskamp is the favorite to win the election in November.

Economics Professor Rob Catlett helped run the event, and students since the debate have expressed a concern for the aggressive-style attacks by both sides.
“For many students, Monday was the first experience of a political debate at such a high level,” Catlett said. “I think they were surprised by it, but by them being there in person, they could really see some of the issues that come with the seat.”
The First Congressional District is the largest district in the state of Kansas in terms of size. 69 out of the 105 counties in Kansas are included from the Western Kansas border to Lyon County, including Junction City, but not Manhattan or Wichita. All three candidates all won their respective primaries for their parties.
Jilka said that he would have voted for the health care bill, and his plan was to repair the bill, not repeal it. Huelskamp says he would have voted against it saying that the people in Washington didn’t read the bill before it passed.
ASG Senator Luke Chiddix believed after the debate that neither side really took advantage of the forum.
“Because of the style of the forum, it kind of dictated how the candidates spent their time addressing issues,” Chiddix said. “Neither side really brought their ‘A’ game.”
The election is to be held on Tuesday Nov. 2. Advanced balloting can be done before Oct. 15. Anyone interested in watching the debate can watch the taping set to air on KTWU on Oct. 31at 2 p.m.

Chris Hopkins

 
Annual Huge Activities Fair next week
Written by Bulletin Staff
Thursday, 26 August 2010 15:24
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The Huge Activities Fair is from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. next Wednesday in the Union Square and Pedestrian Mall between Plumb Hall and Morse Complex.

“Basically, it is an opportunity for all the organizations on campus to promote themselves to students,” said Whitney McGinnis, graduate adviser for ASG and RSOs.

The Huge Activities Fair is an annual tradition held at the beginning of the fall semester and is designed to welcome all Emporia State students. It provides opportunities for students to know and participate in various student organizations.

“This year we’ve added another component in it in that we have some community service organizations from the community who will actually be here to promote themselves as well, and to talk to students about how they can help and can do community services for those groups,” McGinnis said.

There are about 14 different community service groups and non-profit organizations from towncoming to campus on both Wednesday and Thursday.

“Community service is being talked about a lot more, so we’re going to do what we can to give students more information, so instead of the students go to the groups, we can bring the groups to students,” McGinnis said.

Ellie Rivera, junior Elementary Education major, just transferred to ESU this semester.

“We don’t have that Activities Fair in my previous school. I am trying to join in UAC. So I can meet new people,” Rivera said.

To date, there are 45 student organizations that have already submitted the registration form for the Fair.

“Totally we have 130 student organizations on campus,” McGinnis said. “We are hoping we can get 75 or 80 organizations who will be there at the Fair.”

Luke Chiddix, President of Sigma Alpha Lambda-Society of Leadership and Honors, went to the Activities Fair last year and the year before.

“I will be hosting a table for Sigma Alpha Lambda-Society of Leadership and Honors,” Chiddix said. “My team is actually going meet tonight and we are going to discuss plans for that on our first meeting. We should have a pretty good time.”

Chiddix believes that the Activities Fair is a good opportunity for students to involve in the campus life.

“If a student really goes out and looks for organizations to join in and he is proactive, I think it’s a great time to find things to get involved with,” Chiddix said.

Han Yan/The Bulletin