At the University of North Alabama, student government elections are to be held between March 14 and March 16 this year. A number of the Student Government Association (SGA)’s office-bearers are running in pairs for the singular offices of president and vice president, positions that call for joint tickets.

There are plenty of requirements when it comes to declaring candidacy, including a steady GPA of 2.75 or higher, full time enrollment at the university, upperclassmen status, and 2 or more semesters of service in any branch of SGA.

On Monday, March 7, SGA election debates are slated to occur in the SGA chambers, located in the Guillot University Center.

Legislative Affairs Committee chair John Shinholster and Budget Oversight Committee member RJ Meyers are among those in the running for the titles of president and vice president, respectively.

From organizing higher education day to managing funding for registered student organizations (RSOs), Shinholster and Meyers have remained busy for the duration of their time as SGA leaders up to this point.

Shinholster, an upcoming senior, is a social science major with aspirations to teach history and government. His self-proclaimed top priority should he obtain election is safety, a problem he claims has circulated for entirely too long. 

To Shinholster, the ideal academic environment is one where his classmates, namely those of them who are women, can at once go about their scholarly business and have uninhibited fun with their peers. He despises the reality of there being students who feel compelled to be hypervigilant as they walk about UNA’s grounds or, being that they live on campus, as they tend to their residential affairs. Putting plans into motion, he and Meyers have already met with UNA safety officials to discuss promoting a completely crime-free campus.

Immediately following safety, Shinholster wishes to be a proponent of inclusion at UNA. On election, he and Meyers look to speak with the Black Lioness Alliance, led by their fellow SGA representative Lele Emons, about strategies for making sure that UNA’s underrepresented and marginalized groups have their voices heard.

“We want equal representation in the SGA chambers and equal representation on campus. I think we’ve got some really good ideas as far as achieving that representation goes,” says Shinholster.

During the summer that preceded this academic year, SGA president Jake Statom attracted controversy with an Instagram post on his personal account indicating his condemnation of the LGBTQ community. Despite an apology on Statom’s part, not to mention a conceivably large amount of attempted damage control, his misstep has rendered student government a thing of aversion for many at UNA. Shinholster and Meyers have geared their campaign towards ameliorating said aversion. They want students from all backgrounds and of all inclinations to be as comfortable expressing their opinions to student government associates as possible.

Meyers, a second-year student with enough hours to be considered a junior, is majoring in electromechanical engineering. As far as his study of chemistry goes, he likes taking hands-on approaches to problem-solving. He faces issues pertaining to his place in SGA in a similarly active manner. Since May of last year, the Budget Oversight Committee he belongs to has allocated over $67 thousand to RSOs. With respect to his campaign for vice president, he is prioritizing seeing that UNA students know they can trust in their government. 

“SGA exists to serve them,” he says, “so I would like to connect with them better.”

Putting aside any technical, governmental structure-based incongruencies they may have, Shinholster and Meyers have joined forces with a common purpose. Together, they aim to demystify government as it relates to the people in attendance at UNA. They lament the scarcity of students who go to SGA meetings, and they hope to improve relations between the governing body and its constituents. 

“We do agree to disagree sometimes, but the thing is, when I chose RJ to be my running mate, I knew this wouldn’t matter in the long run,” Shinholster says,” In the senate, all of us in SGA disagree to some measure every time we meet. We can move past these disagreements in the best interests of the students we represent.”

Shinholster’s compulsion to choose Meyers as his potential vice president came from his involvement in the Budget Oversight Committee. While he was acting as a supervisor to the committee, he noticed he had a considerable share of ideals in common with Meyers. Upon meeting, the two men got to talking. 

“We decided we had a pretty good idea of what people wanted, based on our separate conversations with different students and our conversations with each other. Now, we have the chance to actually do something with our knowledge,” Shinholster says.

At the core of Shinholster and Meyers’ campaign is a strong desire to satisfy and support UNA students. The candidates’ objective is not to do so without regard for their classmates’ races, ethnicities, religions, genders and sexual orientations; it is to take these factors into consideration and cultivate policies and programs that carefully take into account their identities.