The general elections for student government are open from now until Thursday at 1 p.m. In hopes to introduce their platforms, the candidates for student body president and vice president of academics gathered in the Kenneth N. Gardner Student Center living room to debate their ideas.
Kaylyn Fulton, a dance and business administration major, and Brett Haverts, a math major, took the stage first to discuss topics such as why they ran, what they plan to do with their position, and what they’d like to see improved on campus.
Fulton’s main message surrounded unity between campus departments, such as dance and business. She said she believes her semester of experience being Cajun Syrett’s chief of staff makes her qualified for this position.
“I think that… there [are] disconnects,” Fulton said. “I think that that is something that needs to change. Maybe there is something in this position that I can find to be able to connect different departments more and have more unity between people.”
Havertz, on the other hand, focused more on student representation. His experience in student government for two years as a senator and chief justice is what makes him think he is qualified, he said.
Havertz said: “One thing I do plan to do is I plan to listen to the student’s voice before I make any decision. I want to hear all the students opinions, their ideas, their feedback before I make any big decisions.”
Taylor Godfrey, a senior population health major from Buckeye, Arizona, and Brett Coleman, a junior communication major from Midway, discussed topics such as their qualifications, what changes they wanted to make, and tuition concerns.
Godfrey also focused her message on unity and said she would want to focus on encouraging a community between different organizations such as DSUSA and student-athletes, for example.
“I want to make us more of Dixie and the Dixie spirit,” Godfrey said. “My main thing is I want to unify campus and that obviously begins with the students… to bridge those gaps between those different those organizations and just really push that with the executive counsel to go and reach out to those differnt organizations and those differnt students that people dont usually talk to.”
Coleman, like Havertz, focused on being a representative for the student body.
“To me, student body president means being a representative,” Coleman said.”Being someone who knows how to get among people to learn what things are challenging for them, things that are going well for them, and then knowing how to represent them in the different meetings you sit in.”
Voting is accessible until Thursday at 1 p.m. at https://students.dixie.edu/voting/.