SEPTEMBER 2006 :: ON CAMPUS

Hail to the Chief
On Campus With Joe Pasqualichio, Student Government Leader

By CAITLIN J. NORIS
Special to The Wall Street Journal Classroom Edition

What kind of politician doesn't break a promise once in a while? Back in high school, stung by a failed student-council campaign, Joe Pasqualichio swore that he would never again seek elective office.

"I ran for president and lost," recalls Joe, now a fifth-year senior at the University of Pittsburgh. "I was absolutely upset. I said to myself, 'I'm never running for anything again!'"

Joe Pasqualichio

But barely a year later, he was back in politics. After some initial inquiries, Joe joined Pitt's student government at the beginning of his sophomore year of college and quickly worked his way up. As a senior, he put his high school setback behind him and ran for the coveted campuswide position of student government president.

And this time, he won.

"I love politics," explains Joe, who is majoring in engineering but hasn't ruled out law school. "That's what keeps pulling me back in."

'Some Good Ideas'

As President, Joe is responsible for leading the eight-member Student Government Board and steering almost a dozen committees-including the Allocations Committee, which distributes tens of thousands of dollars to fund nearly 350 on-campus student organizations. Joe, however, says his primary duty as president is to represent the needs of the university's 15,100 undergraduates to school administrators.

"There's not necessarily a divide, but I think there is some kind of gap between the students and the administrators," Joe explains in a telephone interview from California, where he was working this past summer. "Students will ask, 'Why don't the administrators do this?' and the administrators are saying, 'What do the students want us to do?' My job is to report to the administrators and say what the students want or tell them what the atmosphere on campus is. By the same token, I'll go back to the students and tell them what ideas the administrators are developing."

Joe's trail to the top of student government began during his freshman year, when he learned about the organization at a student activities fair and regained his taste for politics. When he was a sophomore, he attended a general meeting and socialized with the board members. Captivated by the chance "to get involved on campus on a larger scale," Joe put in a bid to be chairman of the Academic Affairs Committee, which develops tutoring programs and collects information on scholarships for students.

He got the post. "I had a really high [GPA], which showed my dedication to academics," he says. "But I also had some good ideas, such as an online professor rating system," which he implemented within a semester of taking office.

Later that year, Joe was elected to the eight-member Board, and then was re-elected during his junior year. Although he had wanted to run for president that November, he held back. "The current president decided to run for re-election," says Joe. "I decided I was not going to run against my friend. I was kind of bummed, but I stayed on Student Government Board."

His loyalty and patience paid off. "I think it was that second year on the Board when I really learned the most," Joe says. "I really pulled together everything, got in contact with all the groups on campus, got a feel for what students really wanted, and a feel for the underlying business operations" that keep the Board going.

By November of his senior year, Joe felt he was ready to put together a presidential campaign. "There's a specific process on my campus about how you're supposed to campaign," says Joe. Student campaign managers assist candidates with advertising, choosing issues to address and portraying a good image. "We called it 'the machine,'" Joe says. He campaigned almost nonstop for the three weeks prior to the election.

The election was the first time students could vote for Student Government online; students previously had to cast ballots in booths at on-campus polling stations. Nearly 4,800 students-a high turnout-took advantage of the new system and cast their vote electronically. Joe won the four-way race easily. When the results came in, he leapt out of his chair and shook hands with supporters. "It was absolutely crazy," he remembers.

Full-Time Job

The campaign wasn't as hard as being president would turn out to be. "On a light week, I spend about 20 hours being SG President," he says. "On a really heavy week, it can almost be 40 hours a week-it's a full-time job."

He warns that taking on responsibilities such as his "might mean sacrificing going out with your friends one night a week, or it might mean getting up early in the morning when you want to sleep in." With all the added responsibilities, he had to divide his remaining classes over two semesters to lighten his academic load-which means he'll take an extra semester to graduate.

Additionally, Joe acknowledges that because he's a well-recognized face on campus, he pretty much always has to be on his best behavior. "When I'm out, I try to portray the best image I can as SG President," he says. "I like the fact that a lot of students know who I am, but that's not the important thing. The important thing is they feel like they can approach me. I want to hear every bit of information I can from students because I want to make the best decisions possible."

Joe has led an exciting college career, but says his advice to incoming freshmen is quite simple: "If you only go to class and then go home, you're only getting half of an education." He recommends joining an on-campus group. Not only does it look good on your resume, he says, but it's also a chance to meet new people and take part in something larger than yourself.

"We need leaders badly," says Joe. On a college campus, "I really like the fact that you can get involved and change what's happening for the better."