As students become politically involved, the Polytechnic Undergraduate Student Government has initiated a bill than will help those student activists raise their voice.
The recently approved Senate Bill 6 will remove restrictions in funding political groups at ASU's Polytechnic campus by granting these student groups money as they request it.
Politically affiliated groups on the Polytechnic campus did not have this kind of support before the bill was approved.
However, historically speaking, Polytechnic has not been a campus with consistently active political groups, so funding in this area has not been a necessity for the campus' student government.
For example, Clubs like College Republicans and Young Democrats are not currently active at the Polytechnic campus.
Mary Curtiss, the vice president of policy at USG Polytechnic, said that in her two years in student government, this is the first major positive step toward funding these political movements.
"People are always excited to have a little bit more outreach activities on campus," she said. "If anything, students will feel excited to know that clubs will now have these opportunities (funding) on campus."
Sara Brancati, the USG Polytechnic vice president of services, said this move was made just in time — right before the national general election next month.
She said the upcoming Election Day might inspire students to get involved by voicing their opinions whenever they'd like to spread political activism on campus.
"Now that we have a national election coming up, we should have political clubs come forward wanting to establish themselves," she said.
Student activism, especially political-student activism, is something that's been embraced historically on college campuses around the U.S. Although Tempe is an active campus for political protests, Polytechnic campus has now taken a small step in the same direction.
USG Polytechnic President Ryan O'Hara said that everybody has equal access to funding, regardless of which political party a certain group of students prefer.
"If there's a group that wants to have an event based on the image of pro-life or pro-choice, we are now allowing them to have availability to funds through student government," he said.
Ryan said the best thing he sees going forward is student engagement in healthy dialogue and different students sharing ideas by getting involved on campus.
"Civil discourse — I think that's probably the nicest investing we will do by allowing different people to learn and grow surrounded by different ideas," he said.
He said students will have easier access to political involvement, while USG Polytechnic will provide the funds necessary.
"We're going to be exposed to ideas that we don't agree with," he said. "But the goal and outcome of this new approved bill is very simple, and that is to allow people of different backgrounds and experiences to come together and engage in a conversation."
Correction: Due to a reporting error, a previous version of this article incorrectly named the Senate Bill number. The article has been updated with the proper information.
Reach the reporter at gmijares@asu.edu or follow @thewillmijares on Twitter.
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