The University of Idaho’s student leadership in ASUI has shown over the course of the fall semester that they have a strong grasp on what good leadership means. A stronger idea than many of Idaho’s leaders, including Idaho Gov. Brad Little and the UI administration.
Since the beginning of the semester, ASUI has been urging students to get vaccinated and drawing attention to the fact that Idaho stands dead last in education nationally. They have proven they care for the students by advocating for needed changes that would benefit both our health and our education paired with the “in-person experience” UI insists on having.
House Bill 116, which has yet to pass, and House Bill 377, which was signed by the governor in late April this year, both could have severe impacts on our education at UI.
Bill 116 would give students the ability to opt out of student fees that fund programs like ASUI, the Women’s Center, the Student Recreation Center and many other campus organizations important to serving the diverse student body UI hosts.
While the student government’s disapproval of this bill could be seen as self-preservation, ASUI plays an incredibly important part in representing students when it comes to the UI administration making decisions which affect the student body.
Bill 377, which addresses topics of identity and diversity, directly restricts the curriculum that ASUI senators said would prevent students from “understanding the world they are growing up in,” and many of them called the bill an “abomination.”
ASUI has shown they care not just about the quality of our education, they care about how safely our education is received. They passed a resolution encouraging students to get the vaccine, again reassuring us that it is safe and backed up by research.
They cited Latah County’s increasingly worsening COVID-19 situation and aimed to soothe fears about the vaccine, including the idea the vaccine would affect someone’s ability to conceive.
“According to a multitude of credible sources and experts, there’s no evidence supporting the false claim that receiving the COVID-19 vaccine will impact a person’s ability to conceive,” ASUI Sen. Herman Roberts said. “In fact, people who are concerned about their reproductive ability should want to get the vaccine because it has been shown that pregnant women are more likely to experience worse side effects from the COVID-19 virus itself.”
In an effort to help limit the spread of COVID-19, while trying to reclaim the college experience, ASUI considered passing a resolution which would send a letter to Little urging him to rescind his executive order banning vaccine passports.
Some ASUI senators believed the executive order was limiting the university’s autonomy in responding to the pandemic on campus. But the members of ASUI were split between supporting the enforcement of public health as part of the university’s autonomy or the individual liberty of students if vaccines were to be mandated.
After hearing from multiple students, ASUI voted against the resolution to send a letter to Little and instead voted to place the individual autonomy of students first.
Since Mai and Hettinga have taken to the helm of ASUI, our student government has done exactly what leadership in government should do. They have represented the student body as a whole, not just the parts which would aid their agenda like what many of Idaho’s representatives continue to do.
ASUI has been taking action, and action is what Idaho needs the most right now. If you want Idaho to start rising in the ranks of education and recover from the pandemic, you need to take action too.
Whether that means talking to our representatives in ASUI and the state government, reaching out to our educators or getting the vaccine, follow ASUI’s example and take action.
Editorial Board