By: Dylan Pauley

Student Senate is a student led organization that represents the Wesleyan community. Their purpose is to best communicate the students’ needs and wants to the faculty and administration. 

Student Senate is overseen by faculty advisor Alisa Lively, who is also the director of Campus Life at Wesleyan. She is in charge of making sure the Senate is doing their responsibilities and maintaining a good relationship with the student body and the faculty/administration. 

Hannah Cook serves as President, with Madisyn Fox as Vice President. Nick Calef-Boring fills the Secretary position, and Rian Bigsby holds Treasurer. The group meets with College president Joel Thierstein once a month and report on their meetings and decisions for the student population. 

The big thing that the Student Senate is responsible for is being a representative of the student population to the faculty and administration which is a big responsibility for those students to take. “The biggest responsibility is to be a representative of the entire student body, and telling student concerns to the administration, helping organizations with budgeting and allocating funds, making general important decisions for the campus (such as COVID policies),” said Fox.

Student Senate is very important for students to be able to address their issue, problems, or concerns. Another Student Senate representative, Delaney Gump, said this about the importance of the Student Senate in representing the student body: “Student Senate has an email that is open to students’ opinions and concerns at the handle of studentconcerns@wvwc.edu. If a concern or opinion is sent to this email or expressed to a representative of the Student Senate it is brought up in the meetings for discussion and possible solutions if needed. Student Senate represents the students and it is the mission of the Senate to express the students’ voices.” 

Fox also added to how important Student Senate is in representing the student body’s issue, problems, or concerns. “I think Student Senate is the most important channel to get their concern out to the administration because it is run and led by students who care deeply about making Wesleyan a safe and happy environment for learning.” 

Each Student Senate member has some personal responsibility with their different positions, committees, and chairs that they have. “I am the chair of the Food committee,” said Fox, “so I work closely with Aladdin to make sure students wants/needs are met with the cafe, and relaying students concerns to the advisor, such as safety and accessibility.” 

Gump has a little bit of a different role and was able to explain some of her personal responsibilities “I help rep the student population by taking the concerns of the students by bringing them to the Student Senate for further consideration.” Gump is also the class president of the class of 2024.

For more information about how to bring up issues to the Student Senate, reach out to a member of Student Senate or contact their email studentconcerns@wvwc.edu.