Student Body President Ross Lordo isn't shying away from a fight no one's been willing to take on since the mid-1990s.
It would require an act of the General Assembly to make the Board of Trustees' student representative a voting member, and a bill hasn't been introduced to make that change since 1995. That bill never made it out of committee. The legislature is also already one year in to its two year term, cutting in half the amount of time to get the job done.
But Lordo has already worked to get a bill introduced in the state Senate, and he says to expect a bill to be introduced in the House as soon as its back in session.
"Our goal right now is that we can push for it enough to get it out of committee to one of the chambers or get a hearing on it," he said.
As student body president, Lordo is also currently the students' representative on the Board of Trustees. He attends all Board of Trustees meetings and can sit in on most closed executive sessions. However, he can be barred from certain closed executive sessions, and he cannot vote with the rest of the board.
In Lordo's mind, that's bad for students and trustees alike. He believes that adding a student vote would foster more trust and accountability.
"It equips students and a student body of over 50,000 in the entire system with the ability to have an opinion that is recorded for others to see," he said.
Lordo addressed the issue in front of the 23 voting trustees at their August meeting, and he's hopeful that if nothing else a substantive legislative battle will push university officials to give an official opinion on the issue.
"I think that challenges our administrators, our leadership, on what the student voice and student opinion means at the very highest level," he said.
In addition to voting members and the student representative, the chair of the Faculty Senate also sits on the board as the other non-voting member. That position is currently held by Marco Valtorta, a professor in the department of computer science and engineering.
Valtorta emphasized that the Faculty Senate has not discussed the voting issues, though he said they "will discuss this issue in the fall." But personally, Valtorta cited a study entitled "Statement on Government of Colleges and Universities" which argues "ways should be found to permit significant student participation within the limits of attainable effectiveness." Valtorta referenced the same study at the August meeting after Lordo spoke.
Lordo acknowledged that the transient nature of the student body president affects the Board position but says he also hopes to combat that problem by changing the timeline of SG elections.
Valtorta made clear he still appreciates the sentiment behind Lordo's desire to increase student participation.
"For what concerns the student representative, I appreciate the efforts of President Ross [Lordo] and everyone in student government to be more involved in governance of the university...Working together, we can accomplish a great deal," he said.
He also acknowledged he personally would support "consider opening all executive sessions to the faculty and student body representative."
In addition to increased accountability, Lordo also argues that a voting student member is already common within the SEC. LSU and the universities of Florida, Kentucky and Tennessee all have voting student members.
"You look at your counterparts at other institutions have various structures, many of which are voting members," he said.
While he is aware of the many challenges in the way of passing a bill, Lordo still has faith in his crusade. The fourth-year public health student campaigned on getting students a voting representative on the Board of Trustees, and he describes himself as "optimistic" when it comes to making substantive progress.