Should We Pay Our Student Leaders?

There's a required course at Lyndon State College that every matriculated student must take, must pay for, carries no credits toward any degree and yet if students apply themselves, carries many valuable lessons about life after college. Let's call the  course SGA 101, Principles of Student Government.

Like other governments, SGA operates on "taxes" that are forcibly extracted from students at registration. Student government "taxes" are limited to a maximum set by the Vermont State College and can be set by SGA at any level that does not exceed the maximum. By a strange coincidence, SGA invariably needs the maximum just to make ends meet. Student government could, of course, choose to hand back, say $50, to every student. But this will  never happen.

Another similarity between student government and its real-world counterparts is  that it is besieged by supplicants looking for favors. In Washington,  this is done by professionals called lobbyists, but in Lyndon, students must do it for themselves.

Often funding requests by student organizations are cut. Because this is such a routine part of the process, many clubs ask for more money than they actually need. The cuts suggest that student government has limited funds and must be careful how they are spent. If this were true, funds would tend to run out.

SGA pays self first

But in the last two years, this careful shepherding of student funds has resulted in excess funds that are pocketed by the student government president and other members of the executive board.

Again this is good preparation for life as a tax-paying citizen after college. Our elected representatives in Washington set their own salaries and are currently paid about $174,000, at least four times what the average American earns. Benjamin Franklin, who suggested that elected officials not be paid at all, is undoubtedly rolling over in his grave.

Help for the needy

It would be a nice gesture if student funds, instead of being pocketed by student leaders, were left in the bank for next year. Or maybe the funds could be used to help some needy student of which there are many. If members of the executive board consider themselves needy, perhaps it would have been wiser if they had forgone public office and looked for a part-time evening job instead.