With Undergraduate Student Government (USG) elections taking place next Monday, current President Tyler Miller and Vice President Berkeley Rebman are approaching the end of their time in USG.

The Rebman-Miller ticket has helmed USG during several campus crises, including the pro-Palestine encampment and counter-protests last Spring, the budget and layoff restructuring at CAHSS this fall and, more recently, the Trump administration’s targeting of student protestors on visas.

The Clarion asked Rebman and Miller to name just one moment that stood out as testing their leadership skills the most.

“I would say that there is not a specific one that’s been the hardest. They all have their own challenges for specific reasons,” Rebman answered.

The level-headed response is a glimpse into how the pair approached governing USG.

“Something that we tried to implement through our presidency is the ability to kind of slow down, take one piece of evidence at a time, get it from different sources, try to understand it from different lenses, and gather as much feedback as we possibly can before we act,” said Miller.

Miller said this method is different from prior USG presidencies, which often acted too quickly on information they later found to be false. This level-headedness, Miller said, helped USG deal with misinformation surrounding the CAHSS budget and staff changes this fall.

“When we heard about the CAHSS restructure, the first piece of information we got was that 16 tenured professors were gonna be laid off; obviously that was a massive concern,” said Miller. 

In reality, as the Clarion reported, three CAHSS administrative assistants were laid off when the University changed the format in which faculty receive support. 

“People were calling on us to pass resolutions, make statements, and really try to go to war with the administration. It was really up to us to slow down and go to the administration ourselves,” said Miller.

By “slowing things down,” Miller said, USG was able to get the administration’s perspective on things and engage various staff and faculty leaders before making any decisions.

In the end, Rebman said, while USG senators considered releasing a statement or resolution about the CAHSS changes, no such announcement was made.

Instead, said Rebman, USG’s role was engaging with individual students and clearing up the misinformation while hearing their concerns. 

“What’s been important for us is not putting out these big flashy statements but directly engaging with curious students who want to engage and learn more,” Rebman said.

This more backseat approach may have inadvertently created a disconnect between some students and USG, especially those looking for their student government to take a more assertive and proactive role in campus conflicts.

“We wanted to prioritize that sort of grassroots leadership and to address individuals as they came to us with concerns, but I think there was also a level of disconnect that came from us not making more public statements,” said Miller. “I think there’s a delicate balance that is to be struck there, and I think next year’s student body president could stand to learn from how we did it and from how previous years have done it and try to strike a more balanced approach there.”

Miller said this leadership style was something he had always advocated for, even during his campaign. 

“During my campaign, I described it as the train station, not the train, because so many initiatives are already taking place on campus. Our energy and resources should be going into those that students have already authentically and genuinely created naturally,” said Miller.

This approach, Miller said, was born out of his experience with past USG administrations, who, by prioritizing their projects, would leave student-led initiatives out to dry. 

Miller also implied that he employed this strategy in addressing significant disagreements on campus, such as those over the encampment last Spring. 

“We are supposed to represent students, and if we pick sides, and if we pick individual initiatives, some students want advocacy for both sides of that issue. And so that’s why we should be creating resources and giving support to students to create a level playing field for people to represent themselves, express different opinions, come to the table and have disagreements productively and healthily, and I think that’s the role of student government,” Miller said.

“Oftentimes we look at advocacy, and that’s important, but sometimes if you’re picking a side, you can leave large portions of students on campus out to dry,” Miller continued.

Now, Miller and Rebman will pass the baton to the next administration, which will have to decide and pitch its approach to the student government. 

Yet before doing so, the Clarion asked the pair to reflect on their administration’s most significant accomplishments.

According to Rebman, one such success is how USG has improved its collaborations with other non-administration governing bodies on campus.

“One thing we saw last year, especially around the time of the encampment, was that there was faculty senate, staff senate, grad student government and undergrad student government, but zero communication was happening between them. Yet, they all had similar values and ideas of protecting community members,” Rebman said.

Encouraging communication between these bodies, said Rebman, was a major priority for their administration. To accomplish this, USG rebranded what used to be the committee on “Faculty and Academic Affairs” to what is now the committee on “Academic and Intergovernmental Affairs.” 

This new committee, chaired by junior Senator Micah Denbraber, has ensured that at least one committee member attends every faculty or staff senate meeting. 

“Them being there in those meetings, taking notes and reporting back to USG’s been important to us… It’s been so helpful to know what’s going on with the faculty senate and staff senate… we can all bounce ideas off each other as well,” said Rebman.

When the Clarion asked Miller and Rebman what qualities they hoped the new administration would bring to leadership, they said that level-headedness would be key in dealing with future crises.

“There are a lot of different crises that come up in your time as body president, and I don’t think that’s going to slow down next year… so it’s all about how you react to things you aren’t planning on,” said Miller.

Miller also said that maintaining an open dialogue with the Board of Trustees is an initiative he’s proud of and one that he hopes the next administration will continue.

“[Next week] we are engaging in a dinner with the Board of Trustees, and that’s a student interface with the board that I haven’t seen in my time here, and that’s important because providing student perspective at the highest level of decision making in a kind of respectful and professional way is critical,” said Miller.

This cordial interaction with the board has not always been the approach used by USG administrations. 

“Oftentimes, in the past, all the ways we’ve advocated to the board are through different protests or things like that… so I hope this more informal dinner to get to know the board of trustees and build those kind of connections and bridges, I hope that’s something we can continue in the future,” said Miller. 

According to Rebman and Miller, advocacy is a primary way to support vulnerable student groups, such as international students. Normalized dialogue with the highest level of DU leadership could facilitate more effective advocacy.

“The most support that we can do [for international students] is advocating and making sure that the systems and structures of the school are working in their favor,” said Miller.

Specifically, Miller mentioned that international students want effective systems for transferring credits and options for accelerated coursework to shorten their degree programs. 

“Advocating to make sure that credits transfer, that all those systems work effectively, as well as making sure there’s a possibility to complete accelerated coursework… we are still working with [International Student and Scholar Services] and the Provost Office, but those are some things we’ve heard from international students about what would be helpful for them,” Miller said. 

“What we’ve seen happen is incredibly unfortunate, but learning to work with and offer support for international students and the communities they are involved in has been something we are working on,” said Rebman.

Both Rebman and Miller seemed content with their impact on USG. Now, students will decide what type of ticket they will elect for next year’s USG presidency.