SGA Year in Review

Author: Sonja Pedersen-Green

Andrew Jacobi '05 had his work cut out for him after being elected president of the Student Government Association (SGA) last spring. The previous SGA, under the direction of Sam Rodriguez '04, was widely criticized for its inactivity and lack of achievements. In his own campaign, Jacobi proposed several major items for the SGA's 2005-2006 agenda. Jacobi told The Middlebury Campus during his campaign that he hoped to, among other things, bridge the gap between the SGA, students and administrators; to amend the physical education requirements so that community service might be completed instead and to send a weekly e-mail to the student body that would detail issues before the SGA.

Looking back, Jacobi says he feels that he has worked towards improving the relationship between students, SGA and administrators. "I think the SGA this year has done a really good job of representing the student body. I have been very impressed with the amount of research the senators do [...] I think the greatest accomplishment of the SGA this year [has been] our ability to objectively observe the sentiments of students and diplomatically relay [them] to administrators." One of those accomplishments was the installation of blue lights on campus this year. In his campaign, Jacobi cited better lighting and call boxes among his proposals last spring, including blue lights as a step towards making the campus a safer place.

As for the weekly e-mails, Jacobi decided that they would be more of an annoyance than anything. After meeting with his cabinet earlier this year, he decided, "Students would hit the delete button on SGA e-mails even faster if most e-mails just stated the minutes from the past meeting." Instead, Jacobi has opted to send out e-mails asking for responses to polls, advertising a committee or letting students know something important - as has been tradition for the SGA.

You may have noticed that there has been no change in the physical education (PE) requirements this year. That idea was rejected in his talks with a couple of administrators early this year. Jacobi now says, "If there is one regret I have this year, it is that I didn't challenge academic decisions as much as I should have. I came in thinking that academics are the realm of the faculty but I think we students have a responsibility to challenge assumptions about our academics and make them heard." Changing the College's PE credits/requirements has resurfaced as a campaign issue for this year's candidates - Jacobi's shortcoming on the issue might prompt current SGA presidential hopefuls to consider a different approach or, as Jacobi suggested, use the impetus of the students to propagate change in the program.

One of the biggest programs that Jacobi oversaw was the implementation not of a campaign promise but of the Napster initiative. The program allows students access to myriad songs from their computers at any time of the day or night. While the program has received mixed reviews and service is not available to many students who use Macs, the SGA says its own polls on the program show positive response from students.

Although Jacobi's tenure saw the removal of the generally popular (among students) MidDRS program and the implementation of the lockdown, he said he feels the College is moving in the right direction, especially in terms of social life. When discussing his efforts to liberalize on-campus party policies, Jacobi said, "The College is moving in the right direction in terms of understanding that the focus of the College must be on ensuring the safety of the students, not on disciplining them."

Despite his inability to convince the administration to change the PE requirements, Jacobi has been successful in at least proposing the issues from his campaign platform. Candidates for next year's position as SGA president can now use his tenure as evidence of the obstacles they may face - with the administration, the students and other members of the SGA.