SGA President Looking Ahead to Bright Future

It's about more than money.

President of the Student Government Association, Nick Russo, wants the SGA to be more than a place for clubs to come for funding requests.

"After attending the SGA conference in Boston back in early August one of my goals is to make the SGA less of an ATM for all the clubs and really expand upon the things we do," said Russo. "As far as working on policy initiatives and making the college a better place for all the students, even those who aren't involved in clubs."

He also wants to make the SGA more organized and focused.

"One of the things we are going to work on at the next SGA meeting is a strategic plan for the SGA," Russo said. "The college has a strategic plan and businesses have them so we figured it was a good idea to have one for the SGA. That way we can have goals that can be formulated by all the SGA representatives and it is not just the executive board having things thrown at us. We can have goals to strive for."

Russo took over the job as SGA President from John Kleinhans last spring.

"The transition was good. (Kleinhans) gave me some advice about how to be a leader," he said. "I took some of it and I am infusing some of my own leadership abilities."           

The length of SGA meetings has been a bone of contention for students and that is something Russo wants to address quickly.

"We are going to make some slight amendments to Robert's Rules, which will hopefully make our meetings a little bit shorter and more efficient," he said. "That is something I wanted to do last year because every year we have students who complain that our meetings are too long.  We want to make them as condensed as possible without eliminating the discussion that needs to take place."

The amount of elected representatives about to join the SGA has Russo thrilled.

"We have 15 elected representatives this year, which is more than we've had to start in the previous two years," he said. "That is already a great place to start things off. I'm really excited for the elected representatives to get to work and provide their thoughts as well."

Russo recently sat down with Interim President Steve Gold.

"He is a great guy and I am really excited to work with him," said Russo. "He has some plans for the college that I really think will benefit all the students. I'm excited for his leadership."

Now that he is settled in, Russo's ready to take on the year.

"I'm excited to see what the year brings."