Keelan O’Sullivan, running on the BARE ticket, writes in about why you should vote for their ticket.
To the Editor,
My name is Keelan O’Sullivan and I’m running for the off-campus senator position in this year’s Student Senate elections on the BARE ticket. There are a lot of reasons I think you should vote for myself and the other members of BARE, but this letter will address one thing in particular I noticed while attending last Wednesday’s presidential debate.
At the debate, I noticed that all the tickets seem to agree on the major issues confronting students both here at Ohio University and across the nation. Each candidate spoke at length about how he or she would address the problems of the increasing corporatization of higher education, the disregard for women, people of color and other historically oppressed groups and the university’s damaging environmental practices. While the ways in which each ticket wants to deal with these issues is vastly different, each of us are at least in agreement about what needs to change in order to make our university a better place.
As a proud member of the Student Union, which has been fighting these issues for several years now, I was interested to see this consensus on the important topics. During last year’s debates, I don’t remember much about the other platforms at all, beyond someone offering a few new TVs in the dorms, which I believe is because they were filled with the trivial concerns so typical to the Senates of years past.
Much of the criticism around the Restart ticket, and this year’s Senate in general, has focused around a perception that we haven’t “done anything.” This is wrong on many levels, and the content of Wednesday’s debate shows that. The fact is, the work by the members of Student Senate who also serve key roles in groups such as the Ohio University Student Union, F--kRapeCulture, New BLAC, Sierra Student Coalition and many others, has drastically changed the conversation around the Senate elections. I’m excited to see this change, but it raises some serious questions about the tickets that have suddenly adopted these concerns as their own.
When you vote on April 14 or 15, I hope you consider which group of students has been fighting for change on these issues well before they entered Student Senate and will continue to do so long after they leave. When all the tickets agree on the problems, the choice between them becomes about the solution. The members of the BARE ticket have, by far, the most experience and authenticity in their fight to offer an accessible, responsible, empowering education to all students. I hope you consider which ticket has always been fighting to eradicate student debt and lower tuition. I hope you’ll consider which ticket has always been fighting to make all students feel safe on their campus and in the Athens community. I hope you’ll consider which ticket has always been fighting to move Ohio University toward an environmentally sustainable future. If you do, I feel very confident that you’ll vote BARE.
Keelan O’Sullivan is an Ohio University student running for off-campus senator on the BARE ticket.
