During the past spring's legislative session in Tallahassee, state lawmakers in a bipartisan effort passed House Joint Resolution 931, the student appointment to the Florida Board of Governors (BOG). This resolution will take the form of Amendment 12 on this years ballot.
In actual fact, this constitutional amendment seeks to remove language from the Florida Constitution that automatically appoints the chair of the Florida Students Association as the student member on the BOG.
If passed, the amendment would form a council of student body presidents as an entity of the BOG, and their selected chair would be the student representative to the Florida BOG. Each student body president from the 12 state universities would thus have equal opportunity to be selected as the chair and ultimately the student representative to the BOG.
Following the abolition of the Florida Board of Regents in 2001, the BOG was created to serve in its place. Of the 17 seats on BOG, one is reserved for a student member. As mentioned before, this student is the chairman of the Florida Students Association.
The Florida Students Association is a private organization which offers membership to the state universities within the State University System. Membership is secured by dues paid by the universities and can range into the thousands per year. The dues are used to help fund the private lobbying aspect of the organization.
The Florida State University Student Government Association made the decision to stop spending student activities and services fees (A&S Fees) because it was not a good expenditure for our students. Other state universities made it clear that they share this sentiment.
As a product of halting pay, FSU was no longer eligible for membership in the Florida Students Association, and ultimately the student body president was made ineligible to serve as the student member to BOG. This pay-to-play mentality is unacceptable. There is no justification to limit such an opportunity to those who pay to a private lobbying organization.
It is important to point out that this is the only mention of a private lobbying organization within the Florida Constitution. We believe that there is no place for a forced private lobbying organization within the Constitution. It is unjust to limit the student representative to the BOG under the implications of a privatized lobby service with disproportionate membership charges.
Additionally, it is important to note that there is also a faculty representative to the BOG. The difference between this faculty representative and the student representative is that the student representative is required to pay a membership fee to have the possibility of serving on the BOG. The faculty member does not have to be part of a mandated fees paying organization. There is nothing equal and fair about that.
If Amendment 12 is passed, the Florida State University Student Government Association believes that the results would be mutually beneficial for the BOG and to 340,000 students within the State University System. No longer will student body presidents be excluded from sitting on the BOG because they did not want to spend thousands of dollars in Student A&S fees on gaining membership to a private lobbying organization.
This amendment will eliminate the pay-to-play mentality and allow equal opportunity for student body presidents to serve as the student member to the Florida Board of Governors.
Harrison R. DuBosar is the director of governmental affairs for Florida State University Student Government.
