Every week it seems like there is something going on at SGA that sparks a new outrage, ranging from impeachment to resignations. So few people run for SGA that positions are completely non-competitive, as this year's senate and presidential ballot proves. There is something fundamentally dysfunctional about SGA that turns senators and students alike from young idealists into political cynics. This insider sees three improvements that must be made to turn SGA from the
campus tragedy into a functional governing body: give SGA more
responsibility, provide members with more incentives, and increase accountability.

The only critical responsibility of SGA is approving student organizations and allocating funding to them. Other than that, SGA's role is simply to serve as a point of contact between non-student organizations and the student body. There is no reason that these functions could not easily be delegated to small committees (like the traffic appeals committee), administrative offices (like the SAC office), and focus groups. The problem with the lack of responsibility is that SGA wastes a massive amount of time arguing over pointless things and it's hard to motivate senators to care about their work. This leads to a lot of arguments, apathy and attrition without any accomplishments. The solution is to give senators more responsibility. The USD administration should mandate SGA approval on some student-affecting decisions such as new buildings, programs and academic policy.

Along with responsibility should come higher incentives to participate in SGA. Responsibility is an incentive itself because it inspires SGA members and gives them a feeling of accomplishment but its not enough. On top of a two-hour weekly office quota, SGA senators spend up to six hours sometimes in extremely dry and grueling sessions. It is a lot of work and extremely hard to endure, even for the most well-meaning senators. This burden will only be amplified along with greater responsibility. One extra line in a resume is not enough incentive; USD should seriously consider investing more resources in SGA. SGA should be given nicer facilities and members should receive compensation either as a paycheck or as a yearly scholarship. This will increase the number of people who want to get involved in SGA, increase the quality of people, give us competitive elections, maintain higher involvement from elected officials, decrease attrition and thus increase institutional memory and effectiveness.

Along with more responsibility and substantial incentives, more accountability is also needed in SGA. Some of the past scandals, including presidential joy rides and a presidential election that justified political apathy among students, could have been prevented or resolved sooner with more accountability and oversight. Moreover, accountability will be necessary to ensure that senators are earning their new compensation and working hard.

It is clear that there is a problem with SGA and this article lays out fundamental changes that will transform SGA into a functioning governing body. A dysfunctional SGA is a terrible thing for the senators themselves and for students on campus who are getting a crash course in political cynicism. SGA, the student body, and the administration at USD all have a vested interest in a dignified student government. The current situation is untenable and so we are left with two options: implement fundamental changes like the ones described above or dissolve SGA completely and delegate its few responsibilities to committees and administrative offices.