Students Hunter Swilling and Colter Anderson take on a platform of lowering student costs in their run for the Associated Students of the University of Wyoming (ASUW) President and Vice President.
Swilling, a Molecular and Physiology Student, and his running mate and Economics student, Anderson, are teaming up to run for ASUW President and Vice President to fight for lowering student fees and tuition, improving communicability between students and ASUW, and restoring student organizations.
Swilling and Anderson are both from Cheyenne and graduated from Central High School in 2019. The duo were not close friends until they participated in first year senate together and found their passion for serving the student body.
“There’s a lot of need on campus,” Swilling said. “Students are struggling financially. Students feel isolated. A lot of minority students and those from marginalized students are underrepresented. They are not taken care of as much as they should be on this campus.”
Swilling is the Chief of Legislative Affairs in ASUW. Swilling has a strong interest for science and hopes to pursue a graduate program where he can conduct scientific research.
“I don’t like drama or feeling sad, I just want science,” Swilling said.
Swilling currently works in a neurophysiology lab where he studies working memory in mice. He is also the vice president of the Best Buddies/Abilities Student Organization, a group that pairs up college students with other students with disabilities to nurture and foster each other throughout their academic careers. He said he likes to read a book a week as well, mostly nonfiction.
Anderson currently holds a position as a ASUW Senator for the College of Business. He is also involved in fraternity life, as a member of Sigma Chi. In his free time, Anderson likes being outside and he likes to read, with a particular interest in historical fiction.
Their first priority is keeping fees and tuition as low as they possibly can, amidst the recent tuition hike.
“During COVID, it is not the time for the university to be raising fees,” Swilling said.
If elected, they have ambitions to support student organizations and revise ASUW’s current fund distribution process.
“It’s rough to meet people and have a community,” Anderson said. “Student organizations are important for student life and the college experience.”
“ASUW’s process for funding clubs is very complex and time consuming. We want to make that process simpler,” Anderson said.
They said they want to help clubs with marketing and recruitment to prop them back up on their feet. They suggested updating the incredibly outdates WyoConnect page that lists student organizations. Swilling said half of the organizations on the website are dead or not updated with the proper contact information.
Swilling and Anderson finally want to improve communication between the student body and ASUW. Most information on ASUW’s actions are from emails, but most people ignore them. Swilling and Anderson suggested setting up a WyoCourses ASUW page to make it easier for students to know what’s going on.
In light of the budget cuts, Anderson and Swilling will fight for humanities programs.
“Administration has to value all programs equally. There is currently a lot of emphasis on stem education at the University of Wyoming but those programs are not more valuable than humanities,” Swilling said.
Anderson said he wants to make sure programs students are interested in keep their quality and stay on campus. He cautioned the university to be more proactive in the future in addressing budgetary concerns for rainy days like this one.
