Student Senate hosts final debate ahead of today’s election

Ohio University Student Senate hosted a second debate Monday for the three tickets running for president, vice president and treasurer. EMPOWEROHIO, the Handle-Davis campaign and the Lewis-Gordillo-Farmer campaign were all present. The debate was moderated by Jalen Tolbert, an associate justice on senate’s Judicial Panel. 

EMPOWEROHIO consists of Trinity Robinson as the presidential candidate, Dylan DeMonte as the vice presidential candidate and Arthur Bargainer as the treasurer candidate. Handle-Davis has Megan Handle as the presidential candidate and Isaac Davis as the vice presidential candidate. The Lewis-Gordillo-Farmer campaign consists of Clay Lewis as the presidential candidate, Dan Gordillo as the vice presidential candidate and Reagan Farmer as the treasurer candidate. For more information on the candidate visit TNP’s voter’s guide here. 

The discussion began with each ticket member giving an opening introductory speech. Each ticket was given five minutes to divide amongst each of their members for their introductions. 

The Handle-Davis campaign and the Lewis-Gordillo-Farmer campaign used their opening time to talk about their current positions in senate, their year at Ohio U, what they are studying and any other position they hold outside of student senate. Empower Ohio however, used their time to introduce themselves as well as introduce some of the platforms they are advocating for. 

“One big platform point for us is leadership development of students outside of senate. We are thinking about expanding that (leadership development) and doing leadership summits for all students across the board,” said DeMonte. “We believe that if you give the students the tools to advocate for themselves to administration, then not only is it just the student senate in a little corner of the university screaming for change on campus.”

Monday’s debate centered around four main topics provided by Tolbert. Each ticket was allotted three minutes to respond to the given question. All questions were given to the candidates prior to the debate. After each ticket answered the question, 90 seconds were given to allow the tickets to form questions for any of the other candidates. 

The first topic of discussion was plans for student engagement. 

The Lewis-Gordillo-Farmer ticket was the first to respond. Farmer spoke on behalf of the ticket and introduced a possible first-year student retention program. She called it a mentorship program that would start before freshmen even move onto Ohio U’s campus. 

“Our plan is to create a mentorship program that starts at Bobcat Student Orientation, where we pair an upperclassmen leader up with a freshman interested in the mentorship program and they are buddies throughout the year,” Farmer said. 

According to the Lewis-Gordillo-Farmer ticket, this program would be different from the relationship a freshman would have with their RA or a learning community leader. The mentorship program would allow a new student to have one-on-one time with an older student to ask any questions and build an early friendship. 

Gordillo and Lewis also talked about how this program could be extra helpful to first-generation college students, as well as international students. The ticket also mentioned how the program would also add another source of jobs for students at Ohio U.

The Handle-Davis ticket pointed to the Bobcat Safe app as a possible way to engage with the student body. 

“The Bobcat Safe app, we think that it really has the potential to be a one-stop hub for all required resources at the university,” Davis said.“So if students needed resources on how to get in touch with student senate, or how to get in touch with anybody else that they might need to get in touch with, we think that we can compile all of that data and all of those resources…and that can be really overhauled and be a big asset for the university.”

EMPOWEROHIO went into detail about how some current senate members are not putting themselves into enough student spaces. Robinson shared her thoughts that some student senate commissioners do not effectively represent the organizations they have within their commission. 

“Oftentimes we have commissioners that speak about different things that are going to directly affect their constituents. But did you actually talk to your constituents? Are you actually reaching out to the direct people that are within your commission, or even a student organization that is within your commission? There has simply not been enough,” Robinson said. 

EMPOWEROHIO’s DeMonte mentioned his efforts to combat this by visiting numerous different student organizations in his Academic Affairs Commission.

“It’s sitting down and listening to their goals, their challenges and then afterwards talking to their e-boards about what their challenges are as a student organization and then how Ohio University can better support them,” said DeMonte. 

The second topic for discussion was how each ticket planned to bridge the gap between student senate and Ohio U administration. 

EMPOWEROHIO was the first to respond to this topic, stating how DeMonte met with several different Ohio U administrators to try and keep that line of communication as open as possible. 

Robinson echoed this by mentioning what she would do as president: “I believe that it’s very important, specifically within the president’s role, it is my job to establish better communication.”

Handle spoke for her ticket stating that she wants to see more commissioners working with the senate executive staff and Ohio U administrators when producing bills and resolutions. 

“I feel like a lot of times if you’re not in an officer position, you don’t know those internal conversations that are happening with administration,” Handle said. “I had the opportunity to talk to OU’s president and show him my budget for the period bill and I believe that was just such a tremendous leadership opportunity for myself and my role as commissioner but I was also able to bring that information back to my commission.”

Lewis remarked on his conversations with incoming Ohio U President Dr. Lori Stewart Gonzalez and the plans to improve the communities in the Appalachian region. 

“We understand what troubles they have, these are declining areas with their economy, we’re seeing increased numbers of poverty…what we’re looking at is, you know, there’s these passions with new administration coming in, of what can we do to give back to our communities,” Lewis said. 

The third topic was diversity and inclusion at Ohio U. The tickets were allowed to interpret this topic in any way they sought fit. 

The Handle-Davis ticket began the conversation by questioning the effectiveness of  Ohio U’s Make Respect Visible campaign. Handle, who works in the Office of Diversity and Inclusion, referenced feedback she has received from students about the Make Respect Visible campaign. She mentioned how students see the campaign as “performative” and that the actions of the university do not reflect the words of the campaign. 

Handle suggested that the Make Respect Visible campaign can be reformed into a mentorship program using multiple university resources to make every student feel connected and included. 

Lewis, Gordillo and Farmer talked about how they show diversity and inclusion by their own involvement in different organizations. Gordillo also mentioned his hopes to see better representation from religious communities and Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) within student senate to allow even more voices to be heard. 

EMPOWEROHIO wants to address the Diversity and Inclusion Office at the top. 

“We need to address the head and the head is what are the resources that are being allocated to these groups? What are the resources that are being said to directly benefit people of underrepresented communities? Redirecting a lot of the resources that are missing in a lot of these areas is important,” Robinson said. 

The final topic of the debate was campus safety. 

Lewis began the conversation by discussing the issue of food insecurity and financial struggles for students. 

“The reality of it is that a lot of these students can’t (afford to live here). The amount of loans that students have to take out in order to be able to get a degree here is ridiculous,” Lewis said. “We need to be looking at ways that the senate is able to increase not only student wages but increase benefits that these students who work on campus can have in order to be a successful member of this campus.”  

Additionally, Lewis also brought up revising the rules of procedures to make any senate member subject to judicial review if they are found guilty of “any violent crimes or crimes of sexual assault nature.” He also challenged the other tickets to agree to this. 

Davis addressed campus safety by again pointing to the Bobcat Safe app and his hopes to consolidate resources to inform students. The Handle-Davis ticket also proposed attaching a medical ID to the Bobcat ID to help anyone that might be having a medical emergency or creating a virtual Bobcat ID. 

Robinson wants to address campus safety by continuing the senate safety walk and discussed the past success of the walk to place road signs around dorms. EMPOWEROHIO also wants to revisit RA training and ensure that RAs are able to properly handle conflicts.

Tolbert then fielded questions from the audience to round out the debate. 

A member of the audience raised a question directly to Lewis about Lewis’ point of revising the judicial review process, questioning whether or not he would submit himself to that same process amidst sexual assault allegations alleged against him on the anonymous social media platform Yik Yak. 

“This has not been made aware to me and it does not fit with the morals that I hold dear. I am very passionate about consent and about safe sex…however, I don’t believe that I would be a good leader if I did not hold myself to that same standard,” Lewis said in response. “I am not on that app, however, there have not been any beliefs or anything police related so again, I don’t know.”

Lewis refused further comment on the allegations. 

Another question asked by an audience member had to do with how the Lewis-Gordillo-Farmer proposed mentorship program would be made different from other programs that exist already at Ohio U. Farmer answered by potentially offering scholarships to future mentors and centralizing all the other programs with the mentorship program. 

The debate ended with closing remarks, where each ticket encouraged students to vote and thanked them for the opportunity to campaign for their respective positions. 

Ballots for the election are available via email and the results will be announced on Friday.