I am not going to mince words in this column. If you are a student at UNI, you need to vote in the NISG elections on Tuesday and Wednesday. I know what you may be thinking, “Eric, I know nothing about who is running in the elections or what they stand for.” Well, then look it up. It takes 30 minutes to read up on everything about the elections. 

You can go to “Katie and Renae” and “Jared and Tanner” on Facebook to read up about the candidates and their platforms. That will take 10 minutes. You can go the NISGelections.com and read up on the senators and what they want to do. That will take 10 minutes. Finally, you can read up about what you will be voting on for in the ballot initiatives. That is on the Northern Iowan website or on NISGelections.com. That will take 10 minutes. There, that’s 30 minutes. 

I know your rebuttal, “Eric, why should I care about an organization I don’t know much about?” Simple, you deal with what NISG does every day. If you ride the Panther Shuttle or Safe Ride buses, then you deal with NISG. If you pick up a newspaper in the Union, then you deal with NISG. If you are in a student organization like Dance Marathon or ANY OF THE 250+ STUDENT ORGANIZATIONS ON CAMPUS, THEN YOU DEAL WITH NISG. 

The NISG president sits on the Student Services Fee Committee that deals with over $13 million of YOUR STUDENT FEES. The president, VP, NISG cabinet, and senators sit on committees that deal with anything related to: Liberal Arts Core, Education, Student Conduct, Homecoming, Residence Life, Off-Campus Housing, not to mention the dozens of other committees you may not know about but deal directly with you on a daily basis.

I understand that paying attention to student government may not be your cup of tea. You are a busy student who has to work, be studious, and still try to have a social life. But that does not give you the right to be arrogantly unknowledgeable about what is happening around you. If you don’t know much about the election, that’s fine. Look up information. Vote on Tuesday/Wednesday, and forget about it after that. We had less than 15 percent of students vote in last year’s election. With 30 minutes of work, we can drastically increase that number. 

To vote: log on to myUNIverse, go to “Life @ UNI” and on the right side, under “Voting and Surveys,” one will say something like “NISG Elections.” That is where you will vote. Voting goes from Tuesday at 7 a.m., to Wednesday at 7 p.m. You have 36 hours to vote, and voting take one minute. Please, for the love of all things good and great in this world, vote.