Will Pylant, a sophomore from Huntsville, Ala., is running for Student Government Association vice president for Student Affairs. Pylant strives to work on making a positive change on the UA campus that incorporates its rich traditions.
One of Pylant’s primary goals is to create a program he calls “Bama Break,” which will be a comprehensive online resource that will profile student jobs, internships and study abroad programs across campus. In addition to providing information on background, salary and work hours, the site will weigh heavily on student feedback, much like ratemyprofessors.com, Pylant said.
“I love ratemyprofessors.com, and I think this will be a great way to get student feedback and read about what someone else says about your potential internship,” Pylant said.
Pylant also wants to focus on increasing SGA scholarships. He has already influenced the two $1,000 scholarships given out by the SGA in memory of those lost in the April 27 tornado, but Pylant believes the SGA has the potential to go above and beyond these two scholarships.
“I will work with next year’s vice president for Financial Affairs to offer as many students the possibility to win a scholarship,” Pylant said.
Pylant’s third major platform point is the creation of a UA Unity Day, when students and leaders from all three UA affiliated campuses, UAB, UAH and UA, come together as a unified body to learn from each other. Pylant said this will serve as a way to voice concerns and opinions as well as share ways to improve our individual campuses.
Pylant also believes this Unity Day could serve as a way to bridge gaps that are developing between different student organizations on UA’s campus.
“We can bring together the leaders of these organizations, then they will go back to their individual group and say, ‘Well, I got together with this guy today, and he thinks this,’” Pylant said.
Pylant’s final goal is to improve student organization seating. He said there needs to be an up-close look at this great Alabama tradition.
“We need to improve the process,” Pylant said. “Make it work for everybody and, more importantly, every student organization.”
Pylant wants to add application advisors that will be able to help organizations with the application process. He wants to write down clear rules on how the applications will be scored and how each organization will receive each block.
Pylant said that, overall, his primary focus is to serve, improve and work on student life.
“I want to promote campus unity,” he said. “Show that we are trying. Student leaders – we are trying to unify campus.”
