College Hopes Rally Persuades Candidates

Lorenzo Trujillo is hoping a campus election rally scheduled for Monday will persuade some students to run for office the next day in Valley College’s annual campus elections.

The last-ditch effort has become a familiar drill here because not enough students run for office.

According to Trujillo, the student body president, just seven students are running for 14 open positions. Only two of those positions actually have competition--the president and the vice president spots. That means three students are running for other positions unopposed, and that unless something changes there will be nine empty seats on the school’s Associated Student Union next semester.

“It’s a combination of apathy and students just not having enough time to make the commitment,” said Trujillo, a board member for the past three years.

The government is able to function because most of the positions eventually get filled later in the semester by students who are voted in by the student union.

But the lack of student involvement and awareness of the election process is alarming, Trujillo said. In fact, in the past three years, no more than 800 students--out of an enrollment of 16,000--cast votes in the election.

Part of the problem, he said, is that most students do not realize all the good that student government can do.

“We are constantly fighting to make sure things are better for the students,” Trujillo said. “The problem is, when we are doing our job, they don’t hear about it.”

To tackle the problem, the student union created a public relations commissioner a few years ago and has tried to get the word out on next week’s elections through the campus media.

Also, City Councilman Joel Wachs, whose district includes the college, is scheduled to speak at the “Get Out the Vote” rally Monday.

Trujillo, however, said in the end it must be the students who decide to run.

“If only more people would get involved,” he said, “this school could do such great things.”