If the average student thinks fall term means crunch time, they should try being ASUO President Amelie Rousseau.
Though she’s been running the show since late May, the biggest work begins when students return to campus.
“My role is to actively fight for the best interests of students,” Rousseau said.
Rousseau’s term as president began on May 24 of this year, but she started working with former ASUO President Emma Kallaway on a number of projects at the last meeting of the 2009-10 Senate.
These included a campus map imprinted on the ground near the Erb Memorial Union and a television screen in the ASUO office used as a reader board.
The largest project, by far, was the establishment of a sustainability coordinator position. The intent of these projects was for Rousseau to hit the ground running and avoid a slow summer, as has been the case in the past. She said the coordinator would be hired within the first two weeks of fall term and she hopes for the opening of a sustainability center by winter term. Rousseau said that although she appreciates the things Kallaway did for the position, she has some areas of improvement from Kallaway’s term.
“I would have liked to have brought more issue campaign work,” she said.
This summer, she has also worked with her staff on the creation of a civic engagement minor at the University and specifically with Legislative Affairs Coordinators Sara Marcotte-Levy and Ben Eckstein. Their goal is to get 6,000 students registered to vote by Oct. 12. This year, Rousseau hopes to schedule more time in group meetings and fraternity and sorority houses as part of her main goal of listening to the student body.
“I want to do a better job of reaching out to students who don’t usually get heard,” Rousseau said.
Members of her staff seem to have a similar goal. The legislative affairs coordinators, Marcotte-Levy and Eckstein, will work closely with the voter registration drive.
“If every student is registered to vote, every student has a voice in Salem,” Marcotte-Levy said.
Rousseau’s first few months in the ASUO office have been met with some resistance at a few steps. In the process of appointing members to her staff, she created a new executive position, political director. She drew criticism when it seemed the position was created for her boyfriend and former Emerald reporter and editor Robert D’Andrea. D’Andrea recently stepped down from the position, saying that his presence detracted from the ASUO’s ability to deal with important issues. Originally, Rousseau denied that her relationship with D’Andrea was the cause for the position and said there was a need for communication support on staff.
Rousseau also drew fire on late spring projects when senators disapproved of an allocation of money from the 2009-10 school year to the hiring of a sustainability coordinator for 2010-11.
Rousseau said she plans to keep fighting for issues that affect students. She is attempting to implement a smoke-free campus to protect students and staff from the adverse effects of secondhand smoke.
“It’s the right thing to do,” Rousseau said.