Name: Jennifer Lauterbach
Year: Senior
Major: International Business
Minor(s): Accounting & Finance
Hometown: Chadds Ford, PA
Campus Involvement: Student Government Association, Sigma Kappa Sorority, Alpha Kappa Psi, Global Engagement Ambassador, Senior Class Giving Committee
Fun Fact: I’m moving to Madrid next year to teach English!
Claim to Fame: Chair of the Student Issues Committee
Can you tell me more about your role with SGA? What does a typical week look like for you?
I am the Senior Class Treasurer and Chair of the Student Issues Committee. For treasurer, I am on the committee that allocates money for every organization on our campus. We hold about 26 hours of budget hearings (happened last week) every year to hear and recommend the organization’s budgets. We also are presented with special allocations weekly. These could be for conferences, sports games, or anything that is classified as ‘student activities’. It’s really cool to see what awesome stuff students are doing around our campus.
I spend about 15-20 hours a week for student issues. I have my own committee, and we are constantly approached by students with ideas on how to improve our campus. This is everything from our advising system to gluten free options at college coffee (we just made that a thing). It’s neat to have the ear of senior staff along with other leaders on Elon’s campus and see changes implemented. I send about 30 emails a week to set up meetings or to collect information about initiatives we are trying to implement. For example, two big things we’re working on are a smoothie stand in campus rec and a bike share system (kind of like Citi bike in NYC). So we set up many meetings and talk to other schools with similar systems hoping to find valuable solutions to help us present the idea to the university.
Why did you choose to get involved in SGA?
Completely random honestly. I never did SGA in high school, but I was always pretty involved. So when the elections packet came out the summer before freshman year, I just decided to run. That started my 4 year commitment to SGA. I’ve been a Freshmen Class Senator, Sophomore Class Senator, Junior Class Vice-President, and now Senior Class Treasurer. My friend actually did the math and figured out we have spent more than 7 weeks of time in Moseley 215 just from our weekly Thursday 7:30pm meetings. It’s crazy.
What has been the most rewarding part of your role?
Definitely seeing results. It’s cool when students notice a change that I’ve helped to implement. I guess just knowing I have a stake in the University.
The most challenging?
It’s hard to put so much time into something and to see no result or not have people take it seriously. In order for things to carry out, I need the execs help a lot of the time. Next year, we’re making the Student Issues Committee have two chairs, and I think that’s going to be really helpful to balance the work.
What are you looking forward to most this semester?
I can’t believe this this my last semester at Elon. I’m honestly just excited to have some free time to be with my friends and enjoy the remainder of senior year.
Do you have any plans for next year?
I’m actually moving to Madrid in the end of August to teach English for a year! I’m pretty pumped about it.
What will you miss most about Elon?
I’m really going to miss being less than a 3 minute drive from any of my friends. It’s crazy that in just a few months, I’m going to be on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.