The Student Association wants to use this semester to focus on how it can help students get involved with the university and let students see how their tuition is being used.

Mike Theodore, SA chief of staff, said this semester is going to be fast-paced and the SA is looking introspectively at areas that need change. In that respect, Theodore said the “key theme” being carried over from the fall semester is student engagement.

One specific instance of how the SA is looking to increase student involvement is through the Senate elections. SA Senate Speaker Dillon Domke said voter turnout is only 6.5 percent, and the Senate is considering adjusting election dates in the fall or holding spring elections to reach out to more students.

Domke said the Senate is also considering organizing a personality survey for incoming freshman to help them find extracurricular opportunities.

“Unfortunately, there are some people you’re just not going to reach, but we want to try and make sure that everyone can be involved in at least something that suits them,” Domke said.

Within the SA itself, Theodore said there are four major areas where the SA is focusing on improvement: organizational outreach, external outreach, communication and marketing, and finance and operation.

“We’re looking introspectively this semester at what we, as the SA, need to be doing better and how we can be operating more efficiently,” Theodore said. “That’s going to help us be a part of the university’s changing landscape.”

As the university undergoes organizational changes, Theodore, Dillon and SA President Jack Barry said a major external goal would be to push for greater financial transparency for students in regard to NIU’s funding. Barry said the SA wants students to see “exactly where every dollar of their tuition is going.”

“As the Senate and as students, we want to see where our money is going,” Domke said. “There’s a lot of vagueness to what student fees are being spent on.”

Theodore said the SA only controls about 3 percent of student fees and it can be difficult to create change and ensure quality service in academic departments without knowing where funds are going.

“We want those details so the student body can look [at] our priorities financially and say, ‘Is this what we should be spending money on?’” Theodore said. “From what we’ve seen, if students saw where the money was really going, they would say that money needs to be spent more responsibly.”

Domke said it’s important for students to understand the SA is open to their input, and the SA is here to help further the interests of NIU’s students.

“That’s something we want students to know: We’re here for them,” Domke said. “They can come to us and we’ll see what we can do to help them.”