Student apathy detrimental to voice

After the Feb. 9 IDS report “2 parties emerge for this month’s IUSA election,” the editorial board began to consider its preparations to follow a precedent set by former Opinion editors: interviewing the competing executive tickets and endorsing the one best for the position.\nThree days later those preparations stopped.\nThe High 5 party dropped out of the race, and University officials were left waiting and wondering if someone would emerge to compete with Hoosier, the ticket bred from the current administration. \nWe waited and were left wanting. The IUSA elections commission decided Feb. 18 to cancel the executive election.\nThe level of student apathy can turn into a repeated and monotonous theme in opinion pieces if one is not careful. But this grand abandonment of student representation has the potential to lead to a downward spiral, where in years to come students will not have one option for IUSA, but no option at all.\nThis year, we are all lucky the Hoosier ticket appears concerned with student welfare and disappointed at the lack of competition. It seems the party will advocate for the student voice no differently. (Even though, when its candidates attempted to contact constituents through an open forum, they were met with an empty room.)\nHowever, the intense sadness that accompanied the news saga that was this year’s IUSA executive election will leave a bitter taste in the mouth for many of the following months.\nIt is mortifying to realize there are not four other individuals who are concerned enough with the student voice and the actions taken by the current IUSA administration to combat its subsequent party. The IU administrators, professors and the Bloomington community that need to be reminded of the undergraduate student voice, might be correct in assuming it’s illegitimate as a result of apathy.\nSo, a large “thank you” must go to the Hoosier ticket for caring enough about undergraduate life to consider issues that will improve it.\nAnd for the rest of the undergraduate population, let us hope that in the future, student representation does not starve to death.