Students should vote “no” on the ASG referendum

Today students will vote on UNC’s participation in the UNC-system Association of Student Governments — but really will decide if UNC student leaders should work to fix a broken system they are a part of.

The referendum at hand strives to gauge if students believe that UNC should remove itself from ASG and its annual $1 student fee due to concerns that inefficiency in recent years reveals a systemic problem that is beyond repair.

ASG is flawed, there is no arguing that. But given its potential value and low cost, student leaders should spend their time putting forth legislation that will improve ASG, rather than seeking to remove themselves from it. That is what their job is, and they are in ASG to give UNC students a voice among the other schools.

This means you should vote “no” today on the referendum to remove UNC from the ASG.

Your message to student leaders should be clear: Don’t cut and run, work together to fix it.
The ASG president represents all 17 UNC-system schools with his seat on the UNC Board of Governors. Pulling out of ASG would remove UNC’s voice from that group without a visible backup plan.

Complaints about a historical lack in strong leadership in ASG, along with many other institutional problems, has lead to a movement to reform it — something that current and former members of ASG say delegates from Chapel Hill have been a part of, but in discussion only.

Though UNC delegates have been praised for their input, there has not been any notable ASG reform legislation originating from Chapel Hill recently.

To vote “yes” on this referendum would not only hurt the credibility of UNC’s position among its fellow UNC-system institutions, but also would fragment the association further.

Though there has been little tangible evidence recently beyond ASG’s stance on students’ voting rights, the association as a whole has the potential to be extremely valuable.

And again, ASG is an opportunity to be the student voice at BOG meetings. If UNC is to remove its contributing cry from this voice, our students will not be able to utilize the ASG president on behalf of UNC to stand up against issues like proposed tuition raises, gender-neutral housing and the shortening of the drop/add period.

When many of the BOG’s decisions directly affect so many of the students on this campus, this voice is not something we can afford to give up.

Though this voice comes at the expense of a student fee — one that is often criticized for how it is used — it is not as large and refundable as some may think.

From acceptance to graduation, the typical student will see a grand total of $4 spent on ASG.

Yes, the large tuition bill is made up of a long list of these small fees, but even if UNC-CH were to leave ASG, it does not mean that this fee will no longer be there. It is ultimately up to the BOG to decide whether students will pay that $1 fee.

This is the same BOG that created ASG. The same BOG that was pressed by faculty, staff and students to allow ASG a voice in their deliberations. The idea that they would simply allow UNC to not pay this fee, especially in light of the hefty financial support it provides the association, is suspect at best.

The frustrations felt by UNC’s delegates are not unfounded — ASG is flawed in its current state.

The elections for its president are born from a small pool of both candidates and voters — often student body presidents that have just been elected at their own campuses and have no sense of the candidates at hand.

This and the many other issues that ASG delegates believe need reform can and should be tackled in collaboration with other UNC-system schools. N.C. State just passed a resolution to call for reform to ASG; UNC should be a part of that effort and others.

Therefore, students should vote “no” on this referendum and hold their leaders accountable for change. If they put this much effort into the push for this referendum, then it shouldn’t be hard to put the same effort into making meaningful reform.