Have you ever woken up and wondered,
"Why is my day so full of committees? Why is my life full of committees?" Have you ever felt unfocused, disorientated and over programmed at a time when something important must be going on?
For too long, the Student Assembly has left huge pockets of the campus behind. For too long they passed resolutions and applied band-aid solutions to decisions already made by the administration. They've given up on the issues that matter and relegated themselves to a collection of student services. We must demand more! I have come to unite, not to divide. I have come to reform, not to destroy. I'm making people on this campus who haven't heard of Student Assembly care about Student Assembly, and I have real answers to real problems.
It's a disgrace the way the administration has tried to phase out the Greek system. Do they not see the 1,000 points of light that lead students to Webster Avenue and Wheelock street every Friday and Saturday night? As someone who was once anti-Greek and now loves his house, I can tell you that the Greek system has an immense amount to offer, and they must be defended! As president, I promise to leave no brother behind. As president, I promise to leave no sister behind. I promise that every student, Greek and non-Greek, will have a voice in reforming and improving the Greek system, and no administrator will get in our way.
I have worked with activist groups, and none has impressed me more than the environmentalists. They are abounding with creative, financially sound ideas, but the administration always wants to know where the student support is. The Assembly is supposed to be the student support, but where has it been?
And what about the plight of student workers? It should come as a surprise to no one that Dartmouth Dining Services had trouble recruiting this year when they offer $7 an hour. This is outrageous; at Yale, student employees are paid a minimum of $9 an hour. In addition, on the issue of financial aid, Dartmouth has dragged its feet at a critical time when our peer schools are making great strides forward. Harvard and Princeton are both moving away from loans entirely to provide students with grants. Dartmouth, in response, raised its tuition 4.5 percent. We must demand better! The administration has forgotten they are here to serve us, but mark my words, if elected president I will make them serve!
And read my lips: no more committees! Useless committee after useless committee has turned the Assembly into a joke to many students on this campus. We need more focus on fewer issues, focus on big issues and focus on them well. And we will do the one thing no one thought was possible: make the Assembly exciting. I'll close with quote from the great Teddy Roosevelt, who said, "Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win great triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat."
Students of Dartmouth, we will dare mighty things, we will win great triumphs, and we will make the world know that it's hard to stop a moving train!
