Mahone reflects on two-year tenure as SGA president
Since his freshman orientation, Macomb senior Chuck Mahone knew he wanted to become president of the Student Government Association.
Five years later, the Communications and Political Science double major said he has few regrets as he serves his last days in office.
Mahone joined SGA the first semester of his freshman year after being class president for his junior and senior years at Anchor Bay High School. During his SGA tenure, he served as a house representative, senator and committee chair until finally being elected president in 2013.
After two years of serving as president, Mahone talked with Central Michigan Life about the legacy he hopes to leave and the things he’s most proud of accomplishing.
What would you consider as your legacy?
MAHONE: I hope whoever comes after me — not just Ian (Elliott) or Andrew (Zyrowski) — sees I truly tried to work for the students. I was not in this role to build up whatever “Chuck Mahone” was, because I don’t feel you can truly serve the students well if you’re not doing it for them.
What would you consider your greatest accomplishments in SGA?
One is the state of the organization. I think we’re in a good place to hand off to the next president and vice president create good change.
Second (is my work with increasing) the Campus Programming Fund. That doesn’t just affect SGA as an organization, it affects every student at Central Michigan University and that’s what I came here to do, is make positive change for every single student at CMU.
Do you have any regrets? Anything you didn’t accomplish that you hoped to while in office?
If you look at other student governments around the state and country, we are woefully underfunded. Other organizations go to national or state conferences twice a year: once at the beginning and (another at) the end. We don’t have that extra money in the budget.
I wish that (our organization) was able to learn more from other student governments. I wish we had the opportunities to go to these conferences and spend that money so we can find things we can bring back.
Where do you see SGA in the future?
Anyone who’s been (in) SGA for at least four years can tell you (the program) really ebbs and flows with our administration. You need a good president and vice president team to have the organization to stay afloat. But you also need a good team of executive council members.
In the future, we could have an amazing organization that’s firing on all cylinders and getting all sorts of things done or we could have an organization that’s in decline that needs some type of spark.
Do you think the idea of SGA is outdated?
SGA is the formal side of creating change for students. (Change) starts with a disgruntled group of students who have an issue which transforms into legislation pushed through SGA. We are not antiquated, we are absolutely necessary to this idea we call change, especially on campus.
