Almost two months into the POTUS Project, Columbia College Senior Class President Sean Udell said that the project has been progressing slowly, and that he hopes that organizers can use the winter break to ramp up efforts.
So far, POTUS, the Columbia College Student Council’s effort to get President Barack Obama, CC ’83, to speak at Commencement in May, has held a few events to give students a chance to write personal letters to the president that beseech him to come to campus.
Udell said that these events have been moderately successful, but the group is hoping to increase their efforts. Members have gathered about 100 letters so far, he said, and their goal is to reach about 1000.
They would also like various student groups around campus to contribute to the project, he said. So far, the group has received one submission from the Columbia University Wind Ensemble, who recorded a CD for the president, as well as a few letters from other campus groups. Ideally, Udell said they would like to send in 50 projects from student organizations.
“The project is definitely moving slower than I had anticipated,” Udell said.
But Rachel Mark, CC ’11 and one of the media directors for the project, was a little more optimistic.
“I think that given what we’ve done so far, it’s going well,” Mark said.
Organizers said the primary problems have been its overextended students, lack of communication, and little involvement from the other class councils.
School of Engineering and Applied Science Senior Class President Amanda Tan said that SEAS hasn’t been involved very much so far due to scheduling conflicts with the meetings, but that the Engineering Student Council is in full support of the project and plans to have its first letter-writing session during its Winter Holiday Study Break this Friday.
“We will definitely be getting more involved in the project,” Tan said.
Despite the low number of letters, Udell believes students are generally supportive of the initiative.
“We’re just having a difficulty of communicating the real power their voice can have in all this,” he said, adding that, if more letters do not come in, they might consider starting a petition instead.
After winter break, organizers said they would like to step up the pace for the project and increase awareness.
Mark said that she believes a lot of students don’t understand what the project is about, and that the group plans to combat that after break through more events.
Specifically, Udell and Mark both said they plan to reach out to more student groups to try to increase their participation in the project.
“We really want to put student groups’ work on display, and for individual voices to come out,” Udell said.
Mark said that organizers plan to specifically work with some community-service groups and try to get the groups to dedicate their hours to the president.
She commented that most students here already work so hard and volunteer, and “we just kind of want to highlight that activity in our project.”
Mark also said that the group is trying to emphasize that their movement is apolitical. They want Obama to come here because of his alumni status and his achievements, not because of his political party.
Udell added that the project also has to combat the fact that there are several reasons why Obama might not want to come speak at Columbia, including the fact that it is an Ivy League institution that he has publicly called “cold” towards its students.
Therefore, Udell said students need to work to get the president here. Columbia students often feel a “sense of entitlement” in regards to hosting famous speakers, he said, adding that such entitlement is misguided.
“If students are interested in having notable speakers, they have to invite them and work to get them,” Udell said, adding that there are many other colleges at which Obama could speak in May.
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