Last night, sophomore Keith Wilbur was selected to replace senior Allison Arnold as an Ohio University student trustee.
Like his predecessors, Wilbur will not be able to vote at board meetings.
In an editorial we printed Nov. 2, we applauded a Student Senate resolution supporting voting rights for student trustees.
“The trustees themselves have said those voting rights are not necessary… but we feel Senate’s resolution signals a problem,” we wrote. “(The) resolution flirts with the notion that the student voice isn’t being heard.”
Since then, we have yet to find a legitimate reason for Ohio University not to want its student trustees to vote.
Ohio House Bill 111, co-sponsored by Reps. Mike Duffey (R-Worthington) and Michael Stinziano (D-Columbus), was introduced last week and would make it mandatory for public universities to let student trustees vote.
Duffey and Stinziano also co-sponsored a bill introduced last year — House Bill 377 — that originally was meant to do the same thing. But HB 377 was altered after members of the Ohio Inter-University Council, including OU, objected to making the rights mandatory.
Instead, the adjusted bill stated that Ohio universities could allow student trustees voting rights, instead of forcing them to do so. The bill never made it to the Ohio Senate floor.
Student trustees can already vote in more than 30 other states. OU’s main argument — though university officials claim it is not actively opposing the proposed bill — is that the ability to vote would change a student trustee’s role as a student.
“We value their role and want to ensure that their student experience would not be negatively affected,” OU President Roderick McDavis’ Chief of Staff Jennifer Kirksey told The Post.
Not only do administrators oppose allowing students to vote on Board of Trustees matters, but current student trustees don’t even want to be able to vote.
Arnold said the trustees are “extremely effective in their current roles.” But if student trustees — Ohio University students’ only direct voice on the board — are so effective, why have the board’s decisions been so unpopular among students?
Student Senate has passed multiple resolutions saying student trustees should be able to vote. Protests against tuition hikes have been increasingly common, and opposition to the board’s actions has become more and more vocal.
The current student trustees have also said they worry student trustees would be blamed for the board’s unpopular decisions. But the board’s voting records are public, so the student trustees’ effective advocacy for their constituents would be evident.
If student trustees want to represent the rest of us, they should want to have a say. They should not be satisfied with anything less than voting rights, because that’s what they deserve as a part of the university’s “shared governance.”
We haven’t heard any compelling arguments otherwise.
Editorials represent the majority opinion of The Post’s executive editors.
