Lovett School issued the following announcement on Nov. 9.
“At Lovett, there are always a lot of people with great ideas,” Michael says.
“I wanted to make a change by listening to other people,” says SGA President Michael Cohen, “and actually using what they said to drive my decisions.”
Last spring, when Michael ran for President of the Student Government Association, he knew he wanted to be a leader to his peers. He campaigned on a platform of relaunching morning meetings, taking feedback from students, and doing his best to bring the community back together after a challenging year. He admits, however, that it wasn't until this fall that he realized everything that the job entails.
Unlike the four Upper School class presidents, who each just represent the students in their grade, the SGA president serves the entire Upper School student body. The most visible part of his job happens every Tuesday, when he hosts a virtual morning meeting, updating everyone on what is happening around the school.
This practice certainly isn’t the only presidential responsibility. In fact, as Michael explains, the majority of the job happens behind the scenes. He meets regularly with SGA advisor Ms. Hooker and his cabinet to organize events like homecoming week, and he leads meetings with members of the SGA in all grades to coordinate Upper School initiatives.
On top of fulfilling these basic responsibilities, Michael is also doing his best to live out his campaign promise to get advice from his peers on how to improve student life.
“At Lovett, there are always a lot of people with great ideas,” Michael says. The problem is that students don’t always have an effective way of communicating their suggestions. That’s why he, with the help of his cabinet, put together a new system called the SGA Suggestion Box. It’s a Google form where any student can submit an idea for the SGA to consider.
Among the thirteen responses they’ve already received is one requesting for students to be able to wear sweatpants again with their school uniform tops, a temporary policy enacted last winter since we were all eating lunch outside due to Covid. The administration already ruled against the policy for this school year, but Michael doesn’t want to dismiss the idea just yet.
“I could look at it and say that’s not gonna happen, but as long as I put the effort in and talk to Mr. Boswell about it, I’ll feel like I did something.”
At the end of the day, Michael aims to do just that: serve his peers to the best of his abilities, regardless of the end result.
“I want to look back on my accomplishments at the end of the year and say I put in 100% effort into being SGA president,” he says simply. He hopes that, so far, he has succeeded in that goal.
As he continues serving out his SGA term this school year, Michael plans to follow his official, presidential motto, “Stay shiesty.” He defines this slogan as being what he is all about as SGA president: “a combination of just having fun and being serious in order to ‘make some memories’ for this school year.”
Original source can be found here.
Source: Lovett School
Alerts Sign-up