Of History and Student Realities

A classmate of mine was reviewing previous election specials of "The LaSallian" as part of working on this year's election issue. We had a good chat about the things we remembered from previous election, everything from the room to room campaigns, the very intense miting de avance, and of course the election proper. My classmate also mentioned the issues of libel and mudslinging that became points of contention last school year, while I mentioned some of the questions regarding the current lineups of candidates (everything from the number of relatively unknown faces being fielded up to Aimee Chua's sudden return in time for the campaign). Our conclusion: it seems as if controversy has never left the DLSU political scene. Also, I realized that I can't blame some of our student journalists for feeling that they are walking on eggshells during campaign periods, or for being outraged and annoyed at some of the proceedings and reactions of different individuals when they get featured in TLS or Plaridel.

In the middle of a mind-boggling lecture (in organic chem, of all subjects), the Santugon candidates for CLA came in for their RTR. The catchwords for the day: a student centered SC. Now as idealistic and inspiring as this may sound to the uninitiated, this is a concept that requires a lot of guidance and coordination to keep things working smoothly. A student centered SC would (at least in my understanding) require not only a good feedback system, but also properly trained leaders who can mediate and integrate the students' ideas into feasible policies.
Not even fifteen minutes after these candidates left, the Santugon EB lineup knocked on the classroom door, asking also to campaign. Our professor had enough of her lecture being interrupted and thus she refused their request. As useful as the RTR approach is for many students, it is admittedly quite disruptive. Especially now, as teachers and students are trying to cram as many lessons and projects within the last few weeks of the academic year, it can be quite inconvenient and even counterproductive to accomodate all the candidates' requests for campaign time.

Over the day, I got to watch candidates literally running around in single file (reminds me a little of the Final Fantasy games when characters do that very thing), people waving around IDs, campaign t-shirts, and GPOAs. No word yet (as of this afternoon) of the SPOA for the CLA.
After my last class for the day, I got into an extended discussion with Carl, Justin, Monica, and Rocky (Santugon's CLA candidates). I pretty much asked them some of the same things that I asked the Tapat slate yesterday, but I also tried to ask for clarification about their spiel earlier in the day. A lot of our conversation revolved around how Santugon can address some student realities: the difficulty of long-term involvement in community development projects, the lack of an adequate feedback system for the students to make their concerns known to the SC, what the SC can do to address student concerns such as the dress code, the difficulties in processing forms and requests for student activites, and also the concept of "batch unity". Now they had pretty good, occasionally novel ideas, though I know that they could use a certain sense of long-term vision to persuade some of the students. All the more I am convinced that the "chopseuy" vote works. The GPOA approach of Tapat can use the fleshing out of the Santugon SPOA, while the Santugon approach can also be guided by the ideology-oriented training in Tapat.

A friend of mine also happened to be joining in the discussion as well, throwing in her own questions from time to time. When we finally said goodbye to the candidates and went on our way, my friend said, "I was asking questions because I wanted them to think about and voice out their programs." I couldn't resist smiling at this. I think one good thing about these Q&A sessions, whether they are structured as in the Harapan debate this Friday, or if they are as impromptu as the one I just described, is that they force the candidates to carefully consider what they are saying, and also to think on their feet. It is a way for students to learn what the platforms really mean to the candidates.

I also became aware that some people I knew were out on the campaign trail during times when they were supposed to be in class. Though I understand the urgency of the campaign situation, the principle of cutting classes to attend to student politics does not sit so well with me. After all, we are students before we are leaders or campaigners. I feel that this practice of cutting classes just to do the RTR for the day is actually doing one's self a serious disservice. Sure, it is possible to catch up on missed lessons and to cram assignments, but there are always things that can only be learned in the class proper. I don't know if the campaign organizers have ways of addressing these concerns, but I do believe that academic responsibility is something that should be modeled by aspiring student leaders and their campaign managers. How can our student leaders promote an atmosphere of learning, academic excellence and responsibility if they themselves are the first to set their academic responsibilities aside just to increase their chances of getting elected?

It's happened before. Let's not let this happen again!