Some students want The Daily to stop covering UOSA’s ineffectiveness and apparent violations of the Oklahoma Open Meeting Act, but not because they think we’re being unfair.
The most common response The Daily has received to its UOSA coverage is “who cares?”
This fact further highlights UOSA’s failure to convince students that it is a relevant governing body. But there are many ways in which UOSA affects you, and you should care.
More than half a million — $589,688 to be exact — of the OU-Norman campus budget was given to UOSA this year.
The Budgetary Committee is responsible for the allocation of this money, as well as some of the student fees you pay each semester. It’s a big deal, yet its website has not been updated since 2008.
For this much money, we would like to have all resources available to us so we can find out exactly where these funds have been going.
According to the 2008 budget report, Student Congress was allocated $10,500. It’s hard to not care about a group given this much money.
There is no excuse for the Executive Branch, Undergraduate Student Congress, and Budgetary Committee to not have their websites updated.
But some of this confusion may come from the fact that neither Student Affairs nor UOSA understands who controls the budget.
Graduate Student Senate chair Silas DeBoer told The Daily that UOSA has been asking Student Affairs for an Information Technology officer for “three years running,” because Student Affairs “technically are the ones who spend our money for us.”
But university spokesman Chris Shilling said this is “factually incorrect,” and that the budget is “fully under the discretion of UOSA.”
There’s a communication problem here that UOSA and Student Affairs need to clear up.
If UOSA is breaking the law, you should care about it.
The Open Meeting Act is in place to ensure any governing body maintains transparency. UOSA should be held to this standard.
If The Oklahoman uncovered a particular section of the state legislature breaking the law, the attorney general would investigate them.
Yes, the issues are on a different scale, but that’s not the point. UOSA is what matters to the OU community.
We could never spend enough ink educating the public about laws that keep governments transparent. If UOSA members are allowed to violate these standards now, nothing ensures they will act differently if elected to actual state or federal positions later.
As journalists, we have no more rights than you do.
Our profession calls for us to be stewards of the community.
OU is our community, and we’re here to make sure that your representatives listen to you, work for you and operate in accordance with the law.
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euknemarchon 1 year, 8 months ago
Why do we think the Open Meeting Act applies to UOSA? Aren't they allocating student activity fees, NOT taxpayer money?
quotetheraven 1 year, 8 months ago
It has to do with the State receiving federal and state funds, so certain laws are more applicable. At a private college, which say, receives no state funding, then Open Meetings is less important for student government.
whatsherface 1 year, 8 months ago
I'm glad that you now feel you have to CONVINCE us that these UOSA stories should matter to students. For me, and for other students I've talked to as well, it's not just a response of "who cares" it's also a response of being discontent with the way The Daily is covering all this.
Look, I get that students should care about UOSA and what it's doing; and it's fabulous that you're trying to make that happen by showing what it's doing wrong and making students aware. But perhaps the bigger picture really is the fact that students don't care. Maybe an article that truly covered the apathy of students could make the UOSA realize that they need to change their ways entirely? Wasn't it two years ago that the UOSA was left with many empty seats because no one wanted to run for a representative? And let's not forget the time we only had one presidential and vice-presidential candidate. It's already been pretty blatant that less and less people care about UOSA, and that's UOSA's fault.
I agree that we need to make sure UOSA is doing their job, but I'm not sure the way you're doing it is the best. It just feels too forced, like you're shoving it in our face. It's reaching a point where you're beating a dead horse. And no one likes that.