To the students at DU:

We believe in the University of Denver and its community of vast potential. Our Pioneer community is stronger when students thrive. Whether you’re in FSL or an LLC, a club sport or a student alliance, you should feel supported in finding your place and purpose at our university.

We believe students need a sphere of their own at DU. Undergraduate Student Government must be the center of student voice: representing student interests with administration, actively bridging the gap between student organizations, and amplifying student solutions to campus issues.

Our platform has four main pillars: student voice & presence, community unity & inclusivity, campus reform, and making DU the heart of Denver. Over the past few months, we’ve been talking with our campus – from member of sororities to student alliances to athletes – to better understand the issues students are passionate about. This platform is not just a vision to make USG a strong and lasting institution at DU that champions student voice, but a clear plan of action of how we’re going to achieve that.

We want to highlight a few key ideas from our platform. USG needs to have better communication with students on our campus: this happens by increasing the social media presence of USG, actively working with student organizations to highlight important events, and meeting with organization presidents every quarter. The last idea, called the “Leader’s Assembly,” is a twice per quarter forum for all presidents of student organizations to discuss campus issues and find true community in bringing the champions of each student organization together to thrive off of each other’s passions.

Secondly, we want to create a Student Advocacy Team. This free and confidential service would be jointly run with the law school to provide advocacy support to students to help navigate university policies. Whether it’s Title IX proceedings for a victim of sexual assault or resolving suspension for a fraternity, this team would help keep administration accountable to its students for conduct violation claims.

We believe the best way for USG to engage with issues of inclusivity on our campus is to be trained by the Center for Multicultural Excellence and actively interact with student alliances. This is why we support the creation and recognition of the Joint Council for Student Alliances and oversee consistent interaction with USG.

Finally, DU should be an integral part of our larger community. We want to help sponsor a new fall kick-off tradition that features the Mayor of Denver, the Chancellor, and USG to help unite the Pioneer community at the beginning of the school year.

These are just a selection of the ideas we plan to implement if elected. USG has not been a consistently effective institution and we want to change that. We invite you to join us in reclaiming our campus. Go to bit.ly/smitharagon17 to learn more! Thank you for your support.

Sincerely,

Morgan Smith

Darylann Aragon