BRITNEY MALONEY
News Assistant
SGA elections are being held this week, but one aspect of the elections is not so typical: the three candidates running for SGA president are good friends.
“I have both the fortunate and unfortunate circumstance of running against two candidates that are both good friends of mine, and that I respect a great deal,” candidate Kevin Mills said. “In fact, Brendan was my roommate last year, and I took Joanna out for Valentine’s Day this past year.”
SGA President Leon Dixson is graduating next month, and three candidates are vying for the position. Juniors Brendan Groves, Joanna Mason and Mills have been advertising and promoting their candidacy for the past week and each gave a 90-second speech at yesterday’s Convo.
Each candidate wrote in an e-mail that though they hope to win the election, they approve of the other candidates, particularly because they know each other so well.
Despite the friendship that the three share, they each have distinct plans for next year. Putting a stop in tuition hikes and reforming Convocation are two of Groves’ primary ideas for next year if he is elected. He plans on creating a Student Tuition Committee composed of a cross-section of Pepperdine students.
“We’ll make it our mission to ensure that Pepperdine students never again receive an unexpected 6 percent jump in tuition without first being told of the proposal by their elected leaders,” Groves said.
Mason said his goals for next year include making SGA more active on campus and better preparing Pepperdine students for life after college.
“By co-sponsoring events with the Career Center, I hope to encourage students to more actively participate in this valuable resource,” Mason said.
Mills said he has many ideas, including reforming Convocation, bringing more big-name bands to campus, creating a chair position within SGA to provide students with a bigger voice in academic matters and offering more activities for students to grow spiritually.
The three candidates all have leadership experience in both SGA and other clubs and organizations both on and off campus.
Groves serves as the junior class president. Other involvements of his include Pepperdine Ambassador Council, SGA representative in Heidelberg for the second semester last year, founder and director of Direct Step Up Employment Training Program. He is a member of a fraternity, co-founder and co-director of Wishing Well Initiative, a group committed to raising money to build water wells in sub-Saharan Africa for those without clean water, and founder and chairman of the SGA Committee on Social Activism and Advocacy.
Mason’s involvements on campus include freshman class president, contributing to the Convocation Panel that represents students’ opinion on Convocation, working in the Student Activities Office for three years, participating in the Greek system with Pi Beta Phi and volunteering with Project Serve.
Mason has been motivated to run because there hasn’t been a female SGA President in six years.
“At a school where 58 percent of the student body is women, it seems reasonable to have a president who can represent that majority,” she said.
Mills also has a broad background of leadership that he believes qualifies him to be SGA president. He has served as a class senator during his freshman and junior years, R.A. for Heidelberg International Program, president of Golden Key Honor Society, president of Students for the Defense of Democracy, vice president of Membership of Rotaract, Pepperdine Ambassador Council Community liaison, an ICC representative, and he sits on the advisory board for the First Books non-profit in the Volunteer Center.
Elections began Wednesday and will finish at 8 a.m. tomorrow. Students can vote by visiting the Web site studentorgs.pepperdine.edu.
03-23-2006