The Civic Engagement and Volunteerism Office asked for the Student Senate executive board and senators to sign up and become site leaders, and it requested any amount of donation from the Student Senate to use toward Panther Service Day.

The student senators will review the request and provide feedback.

CEVO graduate assistant Alex Martens said Panther Service Day is scheduled for April 18.

He said Panther Service Day is an activity to give back to the Charleston and Coles County community.

Martens said CEVO is hoping for another donation from student government this year because last year, it received $750, which was an increase from the year before because of the prices that T-shirts had increased.

Sophie Cieslicki, graduate assistant for CEVO, said the office will send site leaders and students to assist at places like Douglas-Hart Nature Center, The Whiteside Garden and local living homes.

She said CEVO will also have a blanket-making station again on campus because last year, it made 1,000, which were donated to the community. CEVO is hoping for that same result.

Martens said the applications to become a site leader is not up on Eastern’s website yet, but they will be soon for people to fill them out.

“Last year we had roughly about 400 students sign up, but our participation rate on that day, we only had about 250 show up,” Martens said.

He said he is hoping that student government can guarantee that volunteers will show up because last year, a lot of people did not show, which left many T-shirts to go to waste. 

Student Body President Carson Gordon also explained what Student Senate would do if the university decides to alter the current plan for on-campus classes.

She said if the university decides to make everything online, the student government will take Eastern’s advice and ask how it should proceed.

She said if worse came to worse and the decision affects the Student Body Election, the senate would utilize technology by communicating through videos to still have meetings.

Gordon said luckily, when it comes to the voting process, it is already all online.

“But we definitely will have to reevaluate how we get the candidates’ platform and messages across, and also how we handle campaigning, so we’re potentially going to be looking at a complete overhaul of what a typical election looks like if we do move online,” Gordon said.

She said she is not worried if the board committees will get behind on their work if this does happen because she feels the student government will still be able to get their message across and be productive by using their social media platforms.

Jelan Buchanan can be reached at 581-2812 or at jjbuchanan@eiu.edu.