The Student Government Association (SGA) at West Texas A&M University will soon hold elections for a number of positions for the 2024-2025 school year.

Candidacy forms have closed, meaning no one can be nominated to be in the running anymore, but every student has the right to vote in the elections.

“Students should vote in the SGA elections because their vote matters,” Dr. Chris Thomas, vice president of Student Affairs and faculty adviser of SGA, said. ”Every student at WT is represented by somebody in the SGA. Students should vote so that they can choose the person that they want representing them.”

For anyone not familiar with student government, Dr. Thomas had this to say.

“Student government is multiple things,” Dr. Thomas said. “It is the premiere student organization for this institution. And it is an example or a microcosm of local governance of students at the institution. They are the chief advocates for the university students, the political soul and body of the campus.”

Students at WT could be affected by policy the SGA enacts. Voters can monitor campaigns to gain an understanding of who the candidate is and what they value.

“Voting is very important because there’s very differing views between all the candidates,” William Blackmon, sophomore and student body chief justice, said. “It will definitely affect what bills get passed in the future.”

Many positions are up for grabs going into the next semester.

“We have several senator seats open, as well as there are two candidates running for both vice president and president,” Blackmon said. “Currently, we have, I believe, 12 senators in total. Including all colleges. There are about 30 seats.”

Senate meetings are open to viewing, so anyone who may be interested in the future can go and see what it is really like.

“We meet every week on Mondays in the Senate Chamber [in the JBK],” Dr. Thomas said. “All meetings are open, students don’t have to sign up. Any student could come sit and watch. They can also sign up for an announcement time if they want to address the senate. It’s an important sounding board for the institution.”

Students can vote online this year through a link that will be sent to WT email addresses sometime in the next couple of weeks.

“We decided to do only online elections this semester,” Blackmon said. “That will be posted very soon on all SGA social media and a campus-wide email.”