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Ken Zylstra and his executive team were the winners of the Student Senate elections held last week Friday. Out of a total of 844 voters, their team received 547, or 65 percent, of the votes. Chimes conducted the following interview with next year’s Student Senate President this past Tuesday.

Chimes What was your reaction when you heard the news that you won?

Ken Zylstra The first things I did when I got the news was I called up the two guys on the team. Then I left a mass voice mail with the RA’s on my staff. Then I got a hold of my family.

Chimes How would you describe yourself?

KZ I grew up in Grand Rapids, I went to South Christian High School. My father’s a biology professor here and I’ve grown up with the college for 20 years. Now and all of my siblings have come to Calvin.

Chimes Any hobbies?

KZ I enjoy sports, I enjoy playing football, basketball, and softball. I also love music. I love playing my trumpet. I play in different bands, for my church, etc.

Chimes What activities are you or have you been involved in at Calvin and how have those made you uniquely qualified to represent and lead the students?

KZ As a freshman I came in and organized the pep band and started that up – it had been stagnant for a year and a half. I’ve directed that for the past three years. As a sophomore I was the dorm president for RVD and this year I’m an RA in BHT. I’m also involved in the Calvin College Band – I’ve played there

“...coming in as fresh faces that haven’t been on Senate yet, we hope to evaluate everything that Senate’s been doing... so that we can kind of redirect and make sure that we’re heading in the right direction.”

for three years, and the Calvin College Orchestra where I’ve played for a year. I’ve been involved in the Environmental Stewardship Coalition this year and through those different organizations and experiences I’ve been able to hone the skills that God has given me, especially organizational and leadership skills.

Chimes In your opinion, what is the role of Student Senate?

KZ The Senate is the governing body which represents the students to the faculty and the administration. Their job is to take the opinions and determine what can be changed here on campus and make proposals and present them to the administration so that changes can be made so that the life of students on campus, or just the college in general, can be made a better place.

Chimes What is exactly does the role of president entail? Can you give your job description?

KZ This is a new position for me. I haven’t been involved in the Senate so I’m learning as I go. From what I know, the Senate President leads the Senate, of course, and the student body, leads the meetings and he organizes anything the Senate does, you could say. The president is also involved in many committees – faculty committees. And anything else I will be learning very soon.

Chimes What are the key traits needed for a Student Senate president?

KZ The key skills and abilities/talents: You have to be organized, that’s the key thing. You have to be a leaders and have leadership skills. You have to be a servant. You have to have the social skills, the people skills – you have to be able to communicate with people quite well. In that sense it’s real important for a person to be out in the community and to want to be seen and to hear from students.

Chimes How well do you fit this description?

KZ I’ve been blessed by God with many of these abilities, to a certain extent. I think I fit the mould quite well and if I didn’t fit the mould, I wouldn’t run for president. I’ve been blessed with leadership skills and organizational skills; I love serving people.

Chimes How effective has this year’s Student Senate been and what are some of the things that you would change about how things are done?

KZ Senate’s been effective in that they have been involved in many projects and getting proposals into the administration. Some of the more vivid ones are open house, the extension of hours, and they’ve been also involved in getting more e-mail terminals and extending hours on buildings such as the P.E. building and the Health Center. It’s also been involved in the parking issue, the Master Plan issue and the core curriculum. They’ve been effective in that matter. One thing that I would like to make more effective is the communication between Senate and students and Senate and faculty, but especially to students because I think it’s important for the student body to know who the Senators are, what the Senate is there for, and what the Senate is doing for them at that time. So I hope to improve that and just get Senate more involved in the lives of students.

Chimes What are your goals for next year?

KZ We hope to definitely build up the communication and accessibility of Senate to the students. We hope to get involved in the media, in Chimes and CVN and WCAL. We also hope to get involved by having Senators be assigned to a dorm to get opinions from students on issues.

We will possibly get a column in Chimes to build up student awareness of what Senate is doing. We want to make the web page more attractive so that students will actively seek out and find out what Senate is doing at the time, and so that they can get their opinions on the issues that are being dealt with.

We hope to reach out to off-campus students. There’s a whole big population of off-campus students here at Calvin and we hope to reach out to them, possibly through the Activities Coordinator position or through the Student Activities Board. We want to create more opportunity for off-campus students to get together – whether through Bible studies or just activities in general, so that there are more options for them. We hope to even have a time where we would invite them to our house to fellowship and to give feedback and opinion on what should be done in the next year.

Chimes You’ve used the word ‘redirectionalist’ to describe your team and how you like to go about things for next year. Can you explain that?

KZ Student Senate is heading in a certain direction right now. They’re getting things done, but coming in as fresh faces that haven’t been on Senate yet, we hope to evaluate everything that Senate’s been doing to see if something is not necessary or should be stressed more so that we can kind of redirect and make sure that we’re heading in the right direction. Some things that Senate does and that they’ve done every year . . . we have to evaluate everything Senate does. We have to evaluate why the Senate is doing this, if this is what the Senate should be doing this year and in the future, etc. Maybe we can change things so that we can make it more effective.

Chimes Students have raised concerns over you and your team’s lack of experience. Is this something they should be concerned about?

KZ We’ve been involved in various areas in Student Life and student integration. The variety of ways in which we have been involved help us to see what the students need. Being involved with the students’ daily – being an RA, or a president of a dorm or just being involved in student organizations – allows us to see more of what students need. We’ve had a lot of communication with the students and the way that we’ve been involved with leadership has allowed us to hone our skills. The variety of leadership experiences which we have had are important- they bring a lot of variety to Senate.

I do not think this should be a cause for concern because we will be learning how Senate runs. Not being on Senate will make it more of a challenge but we’re ready to face that challenge, to learn the system and to learn how Senate does the things they do. The end of this year is important because we’re going to try to learn as much as possible with the old Senate in place but we will also have time over the summer to be able to learn and understand what Senate does more so, so that we can be an effective Senate next year.

Chimes What are some definite things that you have already planned for next year?

KZ We really want to get involved with the orientation of freshmen so that they can see who the Student Senate is, what Student Senate does, and what we can do for them, right at the beginning of the year. That may increase their involvement in extra-curricular activities and even Student Senate itself. We can heighten their awareness of what we’re doing and people will want to know what Student Senate is doing as they realize that there is this body at Calvin that is working for them.

Chimes Your team received the majority in the vote. In your opinion, what does that say about what students desire in a Student Senate?

KZ I think that since we did receive a majority of the vote, students do see that we are capable of doing the job even though we don’t have experience. Students also see that there may be a need for some fresh faces to be involved in Senate that have other leadership experience so that we can go in and make the necessary changes so that Student Senate can be more effective for the student body at Calvin. Running for Student Senate isn’t a popularity contest and the people who are elected to that position should be elected because they are seen as being capable of taking that position, not just because they are very popular among students.