Samantha Hirschman | Assistant News Co-Editor

On Thursday, Mar. 12, 2015, Student Senate decided they would not be changing the name to Buena Vista University Council. The organization spent time discussing the topic on Thursday, Mar. 5. According to the Student Senate Constitution, they are required to have the discussion and decision one week apart.

The idea of a name change began in September when the executive board went to a conference.

The definition of Student Senate is “a governing body of a university.” A University Council is “an advisory, deliberative or legislative body formally constituted and meeting regularly” and “an assembly or meeting for consultation or advice.”

The argument made in support of the name change to University Council was made by Rosie Russel and Meghan Harmening. They explained the name Council fits better with the purpose of the group.

“If we don’t change it, we need to live up to it,” Harmening said.

Harmening said that the name of Student Senate gives the impression the group has the ability to do more than they can.

“I don’t feel that we live up to ‘student senate,’” Harmening said.

“It leaves the potential for us to be who we want to be,” Russel said.

Chase Werden adds to the argument of changing the name.

“It’s not that we don’t want to [make changes]. Senate doesn’t have the power to do it. We are not in power to do the things that a Senate is expected to do. It’s not that we can’t move up the ladder. It’s that we’re on the wrong one,” Werden said.

Carlee Brown focuses on the root of the problem.

“I think we need to take initiative to talk to those students and administrators and just say, ‘Hey, can I help with this?’ If we ask if we can help, we will be living up to our name, and we will be talking to administrators in order to create policies,” Brown said.

“We keep talking about the name change and how we don’t live up to the name [of Student Senate]. Maybe we should just do it instead of talking about it. We have so many better things to be doing [than debating about a name change],” Izaak Plunkett said.

Russel defends her argument.

“It is so important to have this conversation and decide what our purpose is. Do we feel like we are representing the school? Are we representing the things that we came into senate thinking about? I think what we all want is a constitution change. We need to be living up to whatever is in that,” Russel said.

On March 12, Student Senate had a written vote. In order for the name change to University Council, two-thirds of the group needed to vote yes. The final vote was yes-5, no-15. The proposal for changing the name to University Council did not pass.

Graphic by Justice Gage