1.    Candidates must be nominated through an election which is held by their respective representative governing body. This election must be publicized and be open to all students who are represented by that body.

• It is important that SGA nomination procedures are standardized. Furthermore, it is necessary that such a standardized process be democratic, as well as representative of the student body, and not simply the student governing organization.
• Another important issue to consider is the possibility of students trying to enter several SGA elections. With student governance (at the local level) being divided by campus (and professional school) some students are dually represented and have the ability to vie for more positions than a student who is not contest to such representation.

• It is important that all candidates in SGA nominations indicate their desired position, and once elected, that a nominee makes clear the Student Affairs committee which position they intend to run for. This was a major problem we ran into on the SAC as some candidates did specify position while others did not.

• I have spoken at length with Ken Swalagin about this issue. The current system casts strict credit-based guidelines for eligibility. While the intent of this credit basis is clear, it is crucially flawed. In the case of a student who enters Rutgers University with an accelerated number of credits from high school, but whose credits do not count directly towards their major and will thus still be graduating in four years, there is no possible way for them to hold a BOT student charter position under the current guidelines. A recent example of this is the EGC’s nominee Christine Lomiguen who entered with 40+ credits, but will still graduate in four years. Thus, she is currently a class of 2009 student. Initially, she was dismissed as ineligible because she currently appears to stand as a junior (and not a sophomore). Furthermore, assuming the election were last year (when she held sophomore credit standing) she would be unable to run as she had only attended Rutgers for one year prior. After establishing this, both Ken Swalagin and the BOT decided she was eligible. Thus, the credit based system is flawed and must either be omitted or clarify all special cases.

• I feel this clause is particularly important in light of this election’s extraordinary circumstances. The responsibilities and importance of the SGA’s role must be clearly outlined. Furthermore, the consequences for not complying must also be clarified. While there are cases where the fault may wrest entirely with the SGA, complications arise when dealing with such a situation. Do we extend a deadline or not? What if it actually was not the fault of the SGA but instead the nominee was late with materials, yet the SGA reports it as their doing to keep their submission? These are the types of questions the SAC was faced with this year.

• Another huge problem we dealt with this year on the SAC was regarding the transfer of information between the Senate Secretary and the SAC. A number of materials were not included. Some documents not received by the SAC were certification from SGA’s as well as documentation clarifying the position the nominee was running for. Eligibility should first be determined by the SAC with ALL submitted materials. Instead, what happened this year was that eligibility was determined by the secretary, and the materials which were used to determine this were not forwarded to the SAC. Unfortunately, many of the documents which contained the eligibility data (SGA certifications) also had information needed by the SAC in order to make decisions. This needs to be fixed.