ASMSU executive candidates talk campaigns, leadership

Who will be ASMSU’s new president and vice president? Votes cast on Thursday, April 6, for the 2022 ASMSU primary elections narrowed a field of four executive teams to two: Lucas Oelkers and Isabella Roccisano; and Daniel Occhipinti and Coleman Neher. The Exponent interviewed the teams about their campaigns:

What made you decide to run for ASMSU President?

Oelkers: “I've been in student government since my sophomore year. I was on our Supreme Court, so I've been involved for a while. And there's a lot of very exciting things and a lot of exciting services that students need and that a lot of students don't know about. An example of that is psychology services. Any student can go and get free counseling services. We have dental services. Go get your teeth cleaned for free. Bounty of the Bridges Food Pantry that anyone who is food insecure, any student, you don't even need to show proof of income or anything like that, can go and get however much food that they need. And a lot of students don't know about those programs and so being involved in uplifting those programs.”

Occhipinti: “I got the email saying that there is still time open to apply to run. It's always something that I thought would be fun, and I voted last year. There’s always things around campus that I just wonder why that's like that, and I'd love to be able to fix an issue. So I kind of just submitted an application. I didn't even tell my vice president [Neher] that I put him on the application but he was totally down to do it. And we started taking our campaign a lot more seriously. We just thought we were the average student so why not do a campaign for students just like us.”

What leadership experience do you have?

Oelkers: “My freshman year I was a Montana FFA officer, and that's an organization for junior high and high school students that focuses on agriculture and leadership, and it's the largest student organization in Montana by three-fold. So, it's a pretty big organization within Montana and I did that all throughout my freshman year.”

Occhipinti: “I'm a manager at Jimmy John's currently. I started working there in the fall of my freshman year, so I don't have to keep watching the bank account go down. I ended up working up to be the manager there. I was the senior leader on our high school cross country team that ended up winning the state championship, so I have a little bit of leadership experience through high school sports.”

What would you highlight about your campaign to MSU students?

Roccisano: “Something we would really like to highlight about our campaign is just the fact that we have projects that we've already been working on in student government that we really would love to continue in those executive positions. Those include the Office of Off-Campus Life, which is a project that Lucas worked pretty heavily on. And then also getting off-campus food into the SUB because we have empty kitchen and counter space that isn't getting used. That's a project both of us have kind of been involved with thus far and we're really ready to use those executive positions to bring them to fruition.”

Occhipinti: “We're the campaign for just the average student which is why we want just as many people to vote. The more the campus gets involved in what the students have control over, the better. And then on top of that, we think our campaign likes to think outside the box. We're kind of not your normal fit candidates but we're willing to bring things to the table and we have a lot of specific ideas that we want to implement. It's more action based than just talking about change.”

On Tuesday, April 19, from 11:30 to 1:00 p.m. a general elections BBQ will take place on Centennial Mall in front of Montana Hall. Adebate between the two executive teams will take place at noon on Wednesday, April 20, in the SUB Union Market. Voting for executive teams and senators will open at 7 a.m. on April 19 and will close at 7 p.m. on April 20. To read more about the elections and the ASMSU executive teams, visit montana.edu/vote.