New focus on research

ASGA is about to announce a brand-new section of our resources at www.asgaonline.com. The new section will be "Research."

We've always done research for our members when asked. If they need help looking into trends on an issue nationwide, we have helped out by surveying similar schools by e-mail, phone, and fax.

Now, it's an official part of our resources. There will be a form that lets members make a research request. And there will be links to past research ASGA has conducted, such as on voting turnout totals nationwide, smoking policies, student discount cards, and student activity fees.

ASGA helps our members most by saving them time. This is just another way ASGA accomplishes that goal.

Two down, two to go

We're halfway through the fall ASGA conference schedule. DC and Chicago are done, with Dallas and Los Angeles coming up.

So far, our attendance numbers for all events are up over last year, which was our best year ever.

It's obvious that ASGA's reputation is growing and the "word-of-mouth" is spreading.

It's an exciting time for ASGA, as we're nearing 1,100 member institutions.

As executive director, my ultimate goal for membership has been 1,500. I predict that we'll pass that in two more years!

600 & Counting!

With seven days to go, ASGA just passed 600 registrants for the National Student Government Summit next Thursday through Sunday in Washington, D.C.

Last year's record turnout was 628 and that is definitely attainable with a week to go.

The National Student Government Summit is the largest and most helpful student government training conference in the nation. Students and advisors from all types and sizes of institutions attend-- about one third are private schools, one third community colleges, and another third public institutions. More than 110 institutions are registered, which is a record.

ASGA Invited to Campus Police National Summit

The John Hopkins University Division of Public Safety Leadership is working in a cooperative agreement with the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) to explore the feasibility of developing a certification program for campus public safety officers.

JHU is holding a summit on September 26-28, 2011 with the project advisory panel and key educational officials to gain a broader perspective and insight on the feasibility of establishing a certification program for campus public safety officers.

Michael Johnson, Senate Speaker at Marist College, will be representing ASGA at the summit. Johnson is studying criminal justice and paralegal studies and has served as Chair of the Safety and Security Committee for the past year and one-half.

ASGA represented at Reagan Awards

The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and GE invited ASGA to send a representative to the 2011 GE-Reagan Foundation Scholarship Program awards ceremony and dinner on Saturday, July 30 from 6 to 8:30 p.m. at the Ronald Reagan Library in Simi Valley, Calif...ornia.

The Program honors students who exemplify the foremost characteristics modeled by our nation’s 40th President: leadership, drive, integrity, and citizenship.

ASGA selected SGA President Chris Harris of Southern Arkansas University to represent us this weekend. Thanks to all of those who applied to be ASGA's representative.

We get invitations like this fairly frequently and will continue to pass along those opportunities to student leaders.

A New Coat of Paint

I've been doing a lot of painting around the ASGA office lately. A fresh, new coat of paint really makes things look great. All of the old blemishes are covered and everything looks unified when it's colored the same.

All of the touchup made me think of the tarnished images of many student governments around the country. Perhaps yours is one of them. Students think you're a joke and administrators don't take you seriously.

By putting a new coat of paint on your "image" you can start changing how students and administrators see you. ASGA has a ton of resources on how to use public relations techniques to improve your image and ability to reach out to your constituents.

If you're not a member institution, join now at www.asgaonline.com.

ASGA in the news

ASGA was contacted by the Los Angeles Times to get student leaders' reaction to the death of Osama bin Laden. ASGA reached out to our members and instantly the Times reporter got calls from 15 students leaders. He interviewed nine of them for his article, which was published. See http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-bin-laden-generation-20110504,0,1617733.story

ASGA is frequently called on by members of the press nationwide. If you're interested in being contacted by the press, please let ASGA know by writing info@asgaonline.com.

What is the average turnout in SG elections?

For years, ASGA has referred to a figure of 2 percent nationwide in Student Government elections. This accounts for all types of institutions, but is lower because so many community and technical colleges either don't have elections or have very poor turnout. However, we have been seeing evidence that turnout has been increasing. So we recently surveyed the nation to see what the current figure is. We've received nearly 400 completed surveys and are aiming for 500. This would be 10 percent of the institutions participating. So far, the turnout is much higher than 2%. About 43% of the respondents have turnout under 10 percent and 70 percent have turnout under 20 percent. The survey so far has higher participation among private institutions and lower participation among community colleges. We're concerned that those with higher turnout are more likely to participate as well. ASGA also gathers data from our own internal research. So in the next few months, we're going to reviewing all of this and producing a report on what the turnout is now nationwide among all types of institutions.

How many women are serving in college student governments?

The Washington Post recently asked ASGA about the percentage of women serving in student governments across the nation. So our team pulled data from our research since we founded ASGA in 2003.

Please note that our data gets deeper and more accurate and thorough each
year. We have hired full-time researchers each year to help us augment the
data. We now have five full-time researchers who spend 13,000 hours a year
gathering data on collegiate student governments.

Here is what we can tell you:

2003

SGA President
women-- 39.43%

Vice President
women-- 53.36%

Secretary
women-- 82.45%

Senator/Representative
women--50.97%

Overall
women-- 51.86%



2007

SGA President
women-- 40.59%

Vice President
women-- 54.72%

Secretary
women-- 77.60%

Senator/Representative
women--54.61%

Overall
women-- 54.15%


2010

SGA President
women-- 39.04%

Vice President
women-- 50.50%

Secretary
women-- 75.24%

Senator/Representative
women--52.01%

Overall
women-- 51.32%

RHA vs. SGA

An ASGA member asked us to research the relationship between the Residence Hall Association and Student Government across the country. Of the roughly 2,000 residential institutions nationwide, 350 returned the ASGA survey. This may be the deepest research in history on this subject.

ASGA now offers this research to all members in our SG Database at www.asgaonline.com.

Mr. Research Here

I feel like my name ought to be Mr. Research. I just completed a project for one of our ASGA members in Pennsylvania. It was more than 30 hours interviewing 34 students, administrators, and staff, plus another 30 researching, writing, and editing a 17,000 word Consultant Report.

It's a whale of a lot of work and time invested. But I'm confident that the Report will give this ASGA member the Action Plan it needs to completely revamp its Student Government Association and make improvements that will last for years.

1,000 Members!

ASGA now has 1,001 member institutions! We passed the 1,000 "barrier" on Friday afternoon. Our Lady of the Holy Cross College in Louisiana was member #1000!

When ASGA was founded in 2001, we always had a goal of recruiting 1,000 member institutions. The more members ASGA has, the more resources we have to conduct research, support our members, and serve Student Governments everywhere.

Our eventual goal is to reach 1,500 member institutions. We're averaging about 125 new members a year, we'll reach 1,500 in about four more years.

It's exciting time at ASGA!