During my time at AU, I called ATV my home. It was a great place to hang out, learn how to work with some of the best people around, and I made some of the greatest friends I’ll ever make in my life.
So hear me out when I say this: ATV, or MGC 256, would never have been the organization it is today without the space it currently occupies. My organization houses a control room, a lobby with five editing suites and a studio decked out with a three camera set-up and a green screen wall. With that space, we built one of the best communities at AU; it’s a group of people who love working with each other and learning how video production works.
That’s why student space is important to me. If it weren’t for ATV, or the space it gave me to hang out with some of the best people ever, I would have transferred. Clubs can benefit incredibly from this.
Some naysayers say, “Oh, can’t these organizations just live off of the email chains and Facebook groups?”
Yes, they can survive. But how about thrive?
Imagine this: a room you can go to where you can meet with heads of the multicultural organizations on campus. Or the acappella organizations. Or even the political organizations. They may have a desk or an office where you can get in touch with them and they have space where they can congregate and call their own. We could have this, but we have to tell President Neil Kerwin this first.
I want to show incoming students that we have these organizations that meet and thrive because they have space to collaborate.
That’s what we want to accomplish with the student space referendum. I don’t just want AU to be the most politically active campus out there. I want a place where the University can point to so they can actually show incoming students where the politically active students meet.
I want to show incoming students that we have these organizations that meet and thrive because they have space to collaborate.
Everybody benefits from this. Greek life, the 200 organizations on campus and the University as a whole. Let’s give clubs and organizations the benefits ATV had all these years. Let’s tell the University that we need student space. So that we don’t just survive. So we can thrive.
Geet Jeswani is a senior in the School of Communication.
