Comprehensive exams have been taken, classes have started and bustling student activity is slowly lighting up the Wabash that has remained dormant since mid-December. Helping guide the influx of events and new organizations is the trusty Student Senate, the 110th in Wabash history.
The Spring 2026 semester marks several milestones for the student government at Wabash. First, Student Body President Austin Pickett ’26 and his cabinet are halfway through their term, seeking to capitalize on the success and growth found in the fall by delivering quality events that will warm up a cold and dreary campus. Second, newly sworn-in Student Senate Chairman Jackson Ray ’28 is taking the reins in the Goodrich room, helping to navigate any procedural hangups Student Senate faces. The principle uniting all members of the Government, however, is a commitment to community and campus unity.
“My biggest goals are campus unity and brotherhood,” said Pickett. “We really want to bring the campus together, get people out of their rooms and bridge gaps within the community.”
As stewards of the budget for student activities, the Student Senate seeks to fulfill most clubs’ requests. With over $100,000 in the budget coming into the semester and an estimated $60,000 already allocated, around $40,000 remains to be used on events that can unify Wabash. Student Body Treasurer Declan Chhay-Vickers ’26, in concert with the Audit and Finance Committee (AFC), emphasizes meeting specific clubs’ financial needs while leaving room for events that all corners of campus can engage with.
“I want to make this semester as jam-packed with experiences as I can,” said Chhay-Vickers. “With the culture of Wabash, COVID-19 really hurt, so it’s been a long, slow and hard build back up.”
A big chunk of the budget, which runs over $300,000 annually, is National Act, which was announced this week to be performed by Nardo Wick on March 28 in Knowling Fieldhouse. The concert’s cost of $60,000 is constitutionally required to be allocated, with much of that money reserved for staging and logistics.
“It’s really great whenever you can get an artist here. We have 60,000 total dollars that get allocated, but only about 40,000 can go towards the artist, so it’s hard to make that stretch with certain artists,” said Pickett. “I’m always impressed by the artists that we are able to attract to our campus with that finance. I want to give [National Act Committee Chairman Bennett Strain ’26] and the National Act committee huge props for being able to put on the event, I think it’s gonna be a lot of fun.”
National Act is only one example of events that all Wabash students can take advantage of. With some successful, proven events like Topgolf outings and casino nights, Pickett’s cabinet is hoping to bring back another event that Wabash hasn’t seen in many years: an all-campus formal. All-campus formal dances were a staple of Wabash in the mid-20th century, but have since fallen to the wayside.
“I think it’s a great way to bring all of Wabash together,” said Chhay-Vickers. “There’s not that many events where you see everybody from everywhere at Wabash together.”
One obstacle to the immediate planning of a campus formal is, of course, financial. Chhay-Vickers estimated the sticker price of such a formal event in the thousands, up to $10,000. One option several executive team members discussed was supplementing Senate’s allocation with a small ticket purchase for students that want to attend. However, there are no details as of yet.
“It all depends on where we hold it,” said Chhay-Vickers. “If we hold it off campus, that’s another expense. If we wanted to add anything to make it special, then that would be maybe an extra expense.”
However, many members of Senate are committed to student government not just as a financial bottleneck, but as a representation of student interests. As the incoming Chairman, Ray brings a wealth of experience in chairing bodies of a similar size. In high school, Ray served as the Indiana delegate for the Conference on National Affairs and chairman of its economics committee. Ray plans to leverage this experience not just to streamline Senate meetings, but to push Senate to think bigger than budgets.
Ray’s vision is a Senate that broadens the stereotypically monetary scope of Student Senate’s purview, emphasizing direct interaction with College administration to represent student interests. While Senate has historically engaged with administration directly through committees like the Academic Policy Committee, Ray wants to revitalize this dimension of the Senate’s mission.
“My primary goal of this term is to look at Senate not only as a rubber stamp for budgets,” said Ray. “I think there’s a lot of good we can do by putting pressure on administrative changes.”
One aspect of this push for student influence on administration is the Morris and Wolcott Resolution that passed this Monday. The resolution targets a maintenance situation in both Morris and Wolcott halls, which are still experiencing lasting damage from flooding last September, which has disrupted the common social spaces, as well as shared laundry facilities. The Resolution is intended primarily to open channels of dialogue between administration and the student body directly.
“In September, there was an accident where both of those basements were flooded and smelled awful for a long time,” said Ray. “They smell better now, but the basements, which are community living spaces, are completely destroyed. We understand that they are in the midst of a handful of construction projects right now, but that doesn’t mean that you cannot maintain the residence halls we currently have.”
Another effort from Student Senate is the SPAM committee, a group that is tasked with solving the recurring issue of all-campus emails. Specifically, the SPAM committee is advocating for a push away from all-campus emails as the main advertisements for club and major-focused events and towards the Engage platform that clubs already use to plan and schedule events.
“It’s been really easy for students to get a lot of their emails lost in the shuffle when they’re getting constant email reminders about certain events that they may or may not be interested in,” said Pickett. “Engage already has a calendar system. You’d be able to click all the clubs and organizations that you want to be notified when they’re hosting something, so you can get those emails that you’re interested in and avoid a flood of things that you’re not interested in.”
A shift towards the Engage platform and a centralized, comprehensive campus events calendar could streamline individual students’ social calendars. Furthermore, Pickett hopes such a system may also help clubs and organizations plan events more effectively.
“It’s hard to go and get great attendance at everything when we have two speakers that are here on a Tuesday afternoon, and then we have three different things going on in the evening,” said Pickett. “Having that calendar through the Engage app would help ensure that all the organization’s members can attend on those days, so we’re not pulling our students in five different directions when they can’t be five places at once.”
Through funding impactful clubs and successful campus events, as well as advocating for change with the College administration itself, Student Senate looks forward to an active and fruitful semester. Above all, Student Senate is measuring its own success by the community it seeks to help cultivate.