SGA elections have come and gone, not that many people really care. Truthfully, I was surprised that even 10 percent of UTM students decided to spend three minutes to vote for the people who will lead SGA through the trivialities of next year.

Even more surprising was the lopsided nature of the races for executive council.

SGA is not (currently) the social club it has been in the past, but it won’t take much to bring it back to its ineffective past. The Dusty Dean administration has been successful in bringing together differing viewpoints and accomplishing meaningful goals. Dean facilitated election reform and brought transparency to the organization, but his biggest accomplishments may very well be in the area of student organizations.

Before Dean’s administration, if you were a non-greek who wanted to be active on campus, you were out of luck. With Dean’s Presidents’ Roundtable and other measures to assist student organizations, effective communication and cooperation began to take root.

But Dean also wanted SGA elections to not be so much of a popularity contest, which may be outside his realm of influence. It seems that for the 10 percent or so who vote, it’s more about who can cook up the better bananas foster than who can make the best proposals. It seems that use of the cerebrum is no longer a requisite for holding political office on campus, as was evidenced at this year’s excuse for a debate.

Now I see why Dusty Dean received a few write-in votes for the presidency; the alternatives seemed out of touch with the real issues on campus. However, they did run effective public relations campaigns.

But now that the dust has settled and the bananas foster devoured, I hope that Effective Connections can connect to the real needs of the students; every problem cannot be solved by establishing an obscure committee. In order to be effective, students must regain respect in SGA, and that can only be done by reaching out. Extramural basketball teams, better communication within Senate and a student success panel do little to help the common man. Ideally, Effective Connec-tions can follow through with the lofty title of their political party, and be the “effective” leaders this campus deserves, but I am skeptical. It is time for those elected to follow through and stop the rhetoric; UTM students deserve more than wasting $40,000 on projects that will not help the majority of students.

I wish Effective Connections luck and implore them to spark genuine interest and continue the legacy of Dusty Dean. It doesn’t take slick slogans, grandiose committees and bombastic linguistics to make a difference on campus. It takes hard work, genuine concern for the students, cooperation among groups and empowerment of the everyday student to make student government something worth our time.