While there are many times the media can be blamed for its inaccuracies, it isn’t appropriate to place the blame on The State News for the current lack of a stronger relationship between the student population and the Board of Trustees.

Despite the fact we have current board liaisons, it has become apparent this isn’t the most effective mechanism for students to depend on when they have issues. In between the three undergraduate liaisons we have, there still weren’t any trustees or administrators outside of the advisers who attended the Academic Assembly’s forum on a student trustee.

While undoubtedly there were some inaccuracies in the details, the fact of the matter is that none of the members of the board did attend. As a student, there are many who feel that while the board’s purpose is to look over the best interests of the university as a whole, in many cases it appears to exclude the students. If any student were to go to the Board of Trustees’ Web site and read the bylaws, although I don’t know who would ever want to, it is evident there is a lack of interest in students even from the governance aspect.

While the board’s relationship to the faculty is stated briefly in the bylaws, the only thing the board addresses in the bylaws is its ability to make policies for students, to enforce these policies and not to discriminate against them. At some point the board needs to be accountable for its role in the deteriorating relationship with students. If the current role of students to the board and other administrators weren’t such a token relationship, maybe there wouldn’t be so many students who felt the need to have a stronger mechanism with the university.

Unfortunately, what we currently have in place is not working and it’s time the whole system be re-evaluated. Don’t blame The State News or the Lansing State Journal for the fact that there is an increase in the strained relationship between the students and the administration. It isn’t the media’s fault we can’t even get our administrators, the ones who we pay to look out for our best interests, to give students the time of day.

Monica Leslie
communication freshman, former Academic Assembly representative for the College of Communication Arts and Sciences