Daniel Valencia, a senior-to-be from El Salvador, has been elected by the University of the Ozarks student body to serve as president of the Student Government Association (SGA) for the 2016-17 academic year.
Daniel Valencia, a rising senior from El Salvador, was recently elected president of the Student Government Association for 2016-17.
Valencia, a marketing and strategic communication major, defeated Walter Godbee 122-104 in a recent run-off election to take the top SGA position.
Valencia has served on the SGA for the past three years, including as vice president for the 2015-16 academic year.
"I’m very excited to be representing my fellow students as SGA president," said Valencia. "I’ve been a part of SGA since I was a freshman with a goal of becoming president and I can’t wait to continue the work we’ve been doing as well as implement some new ideas next year."
Valencia said he ran his campaign stressing several priorities he would tackle as president, including better communications between students and university administrators.
"I think we can try some things to get a better communication flow going both ways," he said. "I’d like to see the students become more proactive in learning about what’s going on around campus that affects them. One way to do that is to get more students to attend the weekly stand-up meeting with the president on Mondays."
Valencia, who will do a marketing internship in Spain this summer, also said he wants to explore more efficient ways to get feedback from his fellow students.
"I want to find better and easier methods where students can provide feedback and suggestions," he said.
In other SGA election results, Valeria Robleto was elected vice president, Azalia Molina was chosen as treasurer and Julio Molina Pineda was tabbed as secretary. Senators elected included, Margie Guerra, Christin Connor, Luis Robles, Allison Lacayo, Kathleen Sotomayor, Hailey Hardgrave, Chesney Skaggs and Feri Hernandez.
In elections for the Campus Activities Board, Sandra Davis was chosen as president and Bethany Watts was elected as vice president.
In elections for Residential Housing Association, Kayla Hackler was elected president.
Topics: Student Events