Hello 2013! Welcome back and I hope you’ve enjoyed your break.

I am thrilled to officially announce this year’s Big Name! As most of you may already know, Grammy nominee and rap artist Wale will be performing for the Student Government Association’s (SGA) annual Big Name concert. The concert will take place on April 20th at night, with Wagner Stock happening during the day on the Sutter Oval lawn. Ticketing information will be made available in the coming weeks.

Want to bring a new club or organization to campus? The deadline for creating a new club or organization will be February 5th. All you need is a club constitution and a list of ten interested members. Check out the SGA website for more details, under the “Clubs and Organizations” link on the sidebar.

For existing clubs and organizations, don’t forget to re-register with SGA by February 5th to remain an SGA recognized organization. This is extremely important. Just go to the SGA website, click “Forms” and follow the links there. Need funding? Budget request forms will be due by February 8th, followed by budget hearings, and allocation of funds before the end of February.

Wagner Cares, with the help of the Wagner College Community, helped to raise over $32,000 for hurricane relief. Funds are going to be available on a proposal-grant-basis that can be submitted to wagnercares@wagner.edu. To all who donated, whether it be time by volunteering, purchased items, or monetarily, you should be proud of this extremely large accomplishment. I am so grateful for the support of Wagner College’s first-class administration, the student’s selfless volunteering, the alumni, locals in the community, faculty, friends, and staff for reaching out during a time of need, the parents for their underlying support, the Wagner Cares Steering committee, and of course SGA. There is a bright future in this organization and while I’ll be graduating in May, I am excited to see what else Wagner Cares will accomplish.

But I don’t want to prematurely celebrate our accomplishments. The recovery is NOT over and there are many families a few miles away that are still in need. That’s why we’ve partnered with the Salvation Army and a grassroots organization called Disaster Dispatcher of the SI Yellow Team to help facilitate our volunteers. Look out for emails and messages on the Wagner Cares website about how you can continue to help. The relief efforts will extend through the Spring semester onward and we would love to have you lend a helping hand. Stay tuned!

On that note, I would like to welcome our newly appointed VP of Community Service, Carolyn Hagerty who will be taking over Katherine Schaefer’s duties on SGA. Congratulations, Carolyn! Want to join SGA? We are now accepting applications for Senior, Junior, and Sophomore Senator positions. Just go to www.wagner.edu/sga/apply and fill out an application by February 4th at 4pm.

Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram @Wagner_SGA

That’s all for now.

Signing off,
Gregory J. Balaes
President, Student Government Association