Today, the candidates respond to the question: "Hypothetical question - You, as SBA President, have been asked to sponsor or conduct an event that has the support of the students. The administration, however, has expressed their disapproval. How would you respond?"

Theresa Bowman - President

The SBA President has the greatest opportunity and duty of anyone in the SBA to represent the collective voice of the student body to the administration and faculty.  As such, my highest obligation as President will always be to the student body.  If the administration disapproves of an event the student body is squarely in support of, I will work to gain the administration's trust in that event.  Where compromise is possible, I will seek a compromise that does not take away from the spirit of the event.  In the extreme event where neither of these things is possible, I would support the event over the administration's disapproval in the most respectful way possible.

Even in the extreme case where no compromise was possible, I would still work to gain the administration's support, understand the source of their disapproval, and avoid future conflicts.  Maintaining a good working relationship with the administration and faculty is essential to the SBA's ability to effectively implement the change the student body wants to see.  In other words, it is crucial that the President be able to build up trust and confidence in her/his relationship with the administration.  As SBA President, I would work every step of the way to gain the administration's support for student activities.

As VP of First Year Students, I have confronted this situation.  I have worked closely with many of the law school Deans and have had the opportunity to develop a good working relationship with the administration.  In planning new student orientation, I came to every meeting prepared to address the administration's questions and concerns.  We agreed on many student events and their scheduling, we disagreed on others.  Where we disagreed I worked to understand their position and we usually reached a compromise.  In the event where that was not possible, I worked to bring them more information on the contested issue and build their trust in my position until I gained their support.

As SBA President, I will work to effectively present the interests and concerns of the student body.  I will ensure that student concerns will always be presented to the administration in a well-researched and articulate way.  I believe that the experience I gained as VP of First Year Students working with the law school Deans will allow me to continue to build on the confidence and trust I have already established.  If elected, I would be able to hit the ground running, immediately taking advantage of my past working relationship with the administration.

Giri Iyengar - President

The answer is both simple and complex. There can be no "bright-line" rule, as lawyers like to say. The SBA would have to use reasonable standards and emphasize its role as the students' representative body, in any negotiations with faculty. At the same time, it is the SBA's job to communicate the administration's point of view to the students. In other words, it is an asymmetrical position between the two bodies but one grounded in reason, fairness and an understanding of both sides needs and worries. I have no doubt the SBA could sort out any such foreseeable problem.

Rushab Sanghvi - President

I believe that learning from the past is an important part of every job.  So the first thing I would try to do in responding to this hypothetical problem would be to contact John Sorrenti, Brett Sheats, and any other former SBA member I could for advice.  Assuming the situation was unique, the first step I would take would be to sit down with the administration and find out why they disapproved of the event and whether there was any way we could address their concerns.  After discussing the situation with the administration, I would write a letter to the students asking for their feedback and explaining the administration's disapproval.  After hearing back from students I would try to go back to the administration with the opinions of those students who supported the event.   After all of this, if the administration still strongly disapproved, I would likely not sponsor the event. The administration's support is essential for many of the activities conducted by the SBA, and fostering good relations with them is imperative, I would not want anything to harm those relations.

Dan Janow - Executive Vice President

This is of course, first a question of degree.  If the administration had strong reservations about an event the student body was lukewarm about it would probably make sense to defer to the administration.  The opposite is of course true.  If the student body really wanted an event that the administration had a few reservations about, the event would likely be held.  Tradeoffs are necessary in the interests of maintaining a strong relationship between the Deans and the students.

However, the SBA ultimately represents the will of the student body.  If both sides strongly felt strongly over a particular event it would be our job as SBA representatives to push for the event.  I have a history of being willing to fight for my constituents in the face of difficulty.  As a 1L representative I received a large number of complaints from my section about one particular professor who was assigning unfairly large amount of reading and then failing to cover all but a few elements of it in class.  The main problem was that students were only doing part of the reading (sometimes not the important parts) and would then fail to grasp the essential elements of the material.  Over a dozen students came to me and told me that they were very upset and were going to go to the professor.  I instead told them that I would present our grievances on behalf of the section.  I did a few polls and after discovering that over 90% of students wanted me to speak with the professor, I started a process for solving the problem.  First, I solicited complaints about the problem so I had a better understanding of exactly why people were upset.  I then approached the professor privately in her office so we could discuss the problem in a professional and detached manner.  After a long conversation, the professor understood the nature of our complaints, and changed the syllabus to focus the reading on the more essential elements of the course.

Ultimately, I felt there was some antagonism from the professor towards me personally.  This had a limited impact due to blind grading, but I was glad that I represented the section, aired our grievances and got a positive result for my constituents.  Emotional and unbridled advocacy for the students against the Deans can be counterproductive, as the SBA has to work with the Deans.  But in that situation, I did my job, which is to represent the people that elect me.

Deep Singh - Executive Vice President

The only way to deal with this problem is to work with the administration.  First, we have to figure out what the problem is - is the problem the event in particular or the larger questions of the types of events that the SBA and the student body are holding.  Then, we can take action based on the type of problem it is.

If it is a problem with the event in particular, we can explore what adjustments or additions can be made to make it more amenable to the administration's concerns.  If it is a larger issue of programming in general then the SBA Executive can sit together and augment their plans for the rest of the year and pass on that information to the new SBA.

Any response and solution to this problem depends on the relationship between the administration and the SBA, and, through the SBA, the administration and the student body.  Hopefully, the SBA will continue to have a good working relationship with the administration where a mutually beneficial solution can be hammered out.