Andrew Baker
Student body officer elections

One must always strive for goals and seek those things in life that make everything meaningful. This is certainly applicable to our years here at SMU. We must all endeavor to achieve our objectives and to fill our days here with purpose. Academic fraternities, athletics, greek life, religious groups and volunteer efforts, along with many other student organizations, aim at doing just that. They all have objectives, and they all have a purpose.

The Students' Association - the Student Senate and its affiliates - places the objectives of the entire student body as its sole purpose. It exists only to fulfill the needs and desires of people like you. If an organization needs funding, it comes to the Student Senate. If people seek change in university policy, they address their concerns to the Student Senate. This year alone the Senate has done many notable things, from doling out dollars to bringing constitutional changes to the students.

The student body secretary is an integral part of the internal structure of the Senate; he or she is responsible for numerous tasks, including recording minutes and e-mailing notices to all the senators. Office work aside, the secretary must be willing to voice his or her opinion on critical issues that affect the entire campus. He or she must know his or her information, must be organized and must be able to step up if need be. I am such a person.

Among my priorities for next year are road improvement, honor code enforcement, off-campus Pony, increased campus security, 24-hour Access.smu and more diverse programming. Of course, the student body secretary is your secretary. Your needs come first. In order to find out what goals the students have, I have attended nearly all of the Senate meetings in the Hughes-Trigg Forum. My devotion to the efforts of the Senate and to the campus community is evident in my service on the student issues committee. Each week I discover things that trouble the average student here. I realize so many good things SMU has going for it, and I learn what must be done in order to make life both on and off campus more enjoyable and fulfilling.

Let us work together to make SMU the university and home we want it to be. Can you smell what the Baker's cookin'? If so, please elect me, Andrew Baker, as your student body secretary.