12 January 2005

Longwood SGA to host and co-sponsor statewide college SGA conference

Longwood University’s Student Government Association will host and co-sponsor a statewide conference for collegiate SGA members on Jan. 21-23.

The Longwood SGA is providing funding for the conference – called VASGA, for Virginia Student Government Association – and is co-sponsoring it along with the SGAs from Virginia Tech and Christopher Newport University. SGA members from all public four-year state colleges and universities in Virginia have been invited.

"The purpose of the conference is to look at student government issues and resolve them together, and also to work within ourselves as an institution," said Alicia Moody, Longwood’s SGA president. "One of the major student goals is to create a Virginia Student Government Association, which will be the focus of one of the workshops."

There’s no cost for the participants, other than their transportation and lodging. They will arrive around 6 p.m. Friday, the 21 st, and that evening there will be a reception and a speaker, who, like other speakers throughout the conference, is a former SGA president from a Virginia school. Saturday’s activities begin at 9 a.m., run all day and end with a semi-formal dinner. Activities will take place in Hiner, Lankford and possibly Hull.

"The last time a (statewide) conference of this nature was held was in the 1980s," Moody said.

Some five spots are reserved for all institutions other than Virginia Tech and CNU, who are being allotted 10 slots. "Longwood SGA members are all fully involved in the planning process and will be involved in activities the entire weekend," Moody said. "All of the schools have said they’re sending people."

The idea for a statewide student government association grew out of the participation by Longwood SGA members at a conference of Virginia 21, a lobbying group for higher education, in September in Richmond. "We discussed the idea with SGA members from Virginia Tech and Christopher Newport, and it turned out they had the same idea," said Moody, a senior exercise physiology major from Woodbridge.

Longwood’s SGA consists of the executive board (president, vice president, secretary, treasurer and two executive senators), legislative board (12 senators) and representatives elected by their organizations, which includes the four class presidents.