News > April 10, 2008

By Elliot Engstrom | News editor

Student body president-elect Jermyn Davis recently sat down with news editor Elliot Engstrom to discuss his hopes and plans for the 2008-2009 academic year. Congratulations on being elected student body president. How do you feel about the executive board that you will be working with next year?

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Jermyn Davis, student body president-elect, hopes to improve communication between SG and the student body next year. (Margot Lamson/Old Gold & Black)

I’m really excited. I’m really happy that each one of us bring something different to the table. We cross so many different lines and so many different borders of our school’s campus; I think that each one of us will help effect change on the campus.

When I choose my new chief of staff, I think it will be someone who is going to be different from me. I’m excited about everybody.

Do you have any specific plans for your first weeks in office?

I have, I got started the next day. I immediately e-mailed my new executive and got the ball rolling.

I’ve already started setting up meetings with different administrators around campus. Although I knew them from working in different projects, I’m just re-establishing myself with them.

I’m also getting more involved with students. In the next few weeks I and the rest of the executives will be meeting with hopefully every organization on campus just to see what’s going on.

We all stressed in our platform that we wanted to bring together communication, and so it’s important that we stress our own platform, but we really can’t serve the students if we’re stressing something for ourselves.

So we’re going to talk to every organization and student group on campus and say, “Hey, what do you want us to do for you next year as your student government executives?”

How much influence do you think that Student Government can have on the changes that are coming to the university in the next few years?

I got criticized a lot in my platform for being idealistic at times. But as I’ve said before, my platform is both visionary, like these are my ideas, this is what I want to do, and also things that are realistic that I know I can change. So, to answer your question, I think we can have a lot (of influence).

I know we’re not the board of trustees, I know I’m not the president of the school, but I think that we can be a central rallying unit for getting students involved. Whether you believe it or not, when we all combine our voices together, we can make a difference. But again, it has to be something that we all get strongly behind. Student Government can have a big difference, and that’s why communication is key.

Is Student Government going to be different next year than it is now?

Yeah, I think it will be different. I think each Student Government is different each year. Every administration brings its own goals and its own personality.

With me, Saket, Matt, Mary Kat, my new chief of staff who we will have hopefully by the end of next week, it will be a lot different I think. For us, it is really important to see what students want on campus.

It’s important to say hey, if there’s a new change on campus, what do students want? Before we act on anything, what do students want? We realize that we can’t always get student opinion all the time because it’s just not feasible, but we’ll try to keep students in mind when we act.

What do you think is the most important characteristic of a good student body president?

Someone who listens attentively, but at the same time gives a voice to what he or she thinks is the best solution. I said in our debate that I don’t think people want an empty vessel just to be there. Of course, my job as SG president will be to advocate for students, but at the same time students look to you to see what you think about the issue before they make their mind up. At the same time, I have to make sure that I’m listening to all the options. But while I’m listening, I have to make sure I’m making the students aware of everything, it’s a two-lane street.

Obviously the student body will want to get things from you, but what do you expect to get from the student body?

More than ever, I expect them to come to me with their problems. Of course for a small issue you can go to your teacher or professor, but for other issues, before going to the OGB with something about Student Government, bring those problems to me first, and I’m sure we can find a resolution because I’m sure that if you have a problem, there’s someone else that has that exact same problem as you.

One thing I’m going to try to do this year is that I am going to try to be as visible as possible. I think it helps with my personality of being a pretty loud, pretty outrageous person at times. When you see me, just know that I’m a welcome person about any problem. If you see me in the pit just know that I’m not busy enough to not hear your questions or your concerns. At all times, please bring everything to me or our other executives at Student Government.