As last semester ended many students were looking forward to finishing the year and going home for a summer of fun and relaxation. Laura Nishida was looking forward to taking over as the Student Government Association president and the year of hard work to come.

The official transition ceremony for Nishida and the rest of the SGA officers took place on April 21 but Nishida has been training for the office since before her election in March. Prior to taking over as president she served as chief of staff for outgoing president Jeff Wilcox. The relationship they formed over the last year is what Nishida believes will make the learning curve much easier.

“We’re great friends,” said Nishida. “He’s willing to do whatever for me. He’s kick started a lot of great things this past year, and I’d definitely like for him to still be included and see these things through.”

Getting things done as SGA president is what Nishida is already focusing on. As SGA president she is required to stay in Knoxville over the summer, which as a Knoxville native won’t be problem. Nishida even looks forward to starting to work on her campaign’s policy points during the summer. The summer for her is where stuff gets done.

“The summer is a great time where we can really utilize things,” Nishida said. “We can sit down and plan out the year.”

One thing on Nishida’s list includes bringing back a campus president’s round table to better facilitate communication of students with SGA.

The thing I’m most excited about is accomplishing the task of pulling every single aspect of student life on campus into SGA. Laura Nishida, SGA President

The round table isn’t all that Nishida wants to get accomplished. She plans to work on finishing online ticketing for sporting events, putting GPS tracking systems on campus buses and pushing for more green initiatives.

“What I really, really hope that our university does is start paying attention to these going green initiatives, which they’ve done a great job these past couple of years,” Nishida said. “Facility Services is working really hard on really trying to get the university to implement these things because they are cost effective measures.”

The most difficult of these ideas will be putting the tracking system on the buses. Currently the city of Knoxville and Knox Area Transit are working on selecting a vendor to install this system on buses, according to Nishida.

“What we’re really trying to do is communicate with Parking Services here and trying to get a student representative on that board,” Nishida said. “We really want them to pick a vendor that will allow for this system to be put on campus.”

Her method will be task oriented and organized. Nishida said she will lay out the policy on her desk or computer and constantly go through it to make sure things are getting done.

“The type of person I am is that if I say I’m going to do something, I’ll try my hardest to get it done,” Nishida said. “What some people don’t realize is our policy points might not get done this year, but we can go ahead and start the work.”

The most important thing Nishida thinks the SGA president does is serve as a voice for the students and reach out to student groups who have never had a voice.

“We want to be more personable, put ourselves out there more and kind of meet people in the middle,” Nishida said about the SGA officers.

“That’s what we’re really here to do is to pull down the administrators and really make them see how it’s going to affect us. You’re that student representative on most committee’s on campus. You’re the representative in a lot of meetings that happen.”
 
Challenges are something Nishida will not back away from. She understands with the budget crises UT is facing some tough decisions. She also knows it will come down to her to explain to the student body why they have to pay more while getting less due to cuts.

“It’s hard, but you do have to say this is why we’re doing it,” Nishida said. “That’s one thing why we want to communicate better with the student body.”

However, the challenge of SGA President is something Nishida is definitely looking forward to.

 “The thing I’m most excited about is accomplishing the task of pulling every single aspect of student life on campus into SGA.”