The elections for the 2008 Wabash College student government produced strange and unforeseen results. The election of the executive leadership – the president and vice president – resulted in a ticket split, where Mr. Juan Carlos Venis ‘09 was elected Student Body President and Mr. John Moton ’09 was chosen as Vice-President. For Mr. Moton, the rise to the vice-presidency began at the start of his Wabash career.
“I have been serving in student government since I got here,” the recently elected Vice-President said. “I was elected as one of my classes’ representatives as a freshman. After acquiring and working through the senate and gathering that experience and being secretary and learning about the processes, I figured the best place to evolve to would be the vice presidency.”
Vice-President Mr. Moton’s primary responsibility is serving as chair of the Senate, the legislative body responsible for appropriating about $200,000 in funds derived from the $225 students pay in activity fees each semester. Mr. Venis will serve as chairman of the Senior Council. As they both lead representational student body organizations, Mr. Moton sees much overlap between their two positions.
“I think the president and the vice-president need to have a very intimate relationship as they do share more than not,” Moton said. “Although I do have specific written responsibilities I need to take care of, Juan has very specific ones as well. I think because of our unique situation, it makes it more important for the two of us to work together and overlap to some degree.”
“It’s almost like a co-presidency,” Mr. Moton added, “for lack of a better term, because there are these two different organizations – the vice-president chairs the upper body whereas the president chairs the lower. I see my position as vice-president as really just trying to ensure the efficiency of the Senate, ensure the efficiency of the money that is spent every year.”
Mr. Moton hopes both he and Mr. Venis can act as student advocates to both the administration and trustees.
“I will be meeting with the NAWM this weekend,” Moton said. “I’ll be meeting with them as one of the student representatives. Juan will be meeting with the board of trustees. I really would like to see Juan and myself attending meetings with the President and Dean Bambrey on a regular basis – not necessarily weekly, but on a structure where we can see what are the colleges concerns, what are the students concerns from their desks, what do they see.”
The campaign waged by Mr. Moton and his presidential running mate, Mr. Sean Clerget ’09 was unconventional in that Mr. Clerget was studying overseas, and an unconventional amount of money went toward their campaign. This spending manifested in the form of pizza, chicken wings and soda for a campaign event, as well as buttons and t-shirts shouting the campaign slogan, “I’m vot’n Clerget Moton.”
The campaign was a way to make the statement that this is a serious event – we’re taking this seriously,” Mr. Moton said. “We want to make it as professional as possible and in order to make things professional, it takes money. I agree we most likely spent more money than campaigns of the past, and the campaign was a mix – it wasn’t completely grassroots and it wasn’t completely large scale.
“It gave us an opportunity,” he continued, “to express what our wishes were for the student body in a public manner, and also the campaign allowed us to do a lot of name recognition and name reinforcement. Sean and I wanted to make it similar to the real deal, a more realistic campaign which would have to put out different things in order for the candidate to be successful.”
In order to pull off events like the rally and campaign paraphernalia, Mr. Moton noted that he received help from a core group of dedicated students.
“There was no (campaign) manager in a specific sense,” Moton said. “We did take advice from individuals. Not too many - I would say a list of maybe three individuals that were helpful in the campaign process. They helped ensure the campaign stayed on message and consistent. Those individuals allowed us to go out and campaign; they were the physical bodies that went out with myself and actually campaigned door to door. They were the core group. I’m sure there were more individuals that were involved with the whole process, but they weren’t intimately involved.”
Even though the ticket Mr. Moton ran on was not completely successful, he still feels the ideas the campaign ran on - responsibility, transparency in student government, and adherence to Roberts’ Rules of Order in governance of meetings - will be incorporated into this new student government administration.
Mr. Clerget will have the ability to help Mr. Moton execute some of the campaign goals, as he was appointed as a Representative for the Class of 2009. As the most senior member of Senate, Mr. Clerget was also appointed Chairman Pro-Tempore and will preside over the Senate in the absence of Mr. Moton.
“That’s part of the Senate’s power,” Mr. Moton said. “The members have a crucial role in ensuring that things happen. I can see where transparency and responsibility can be continued in this administration.”