Mikey Henderson: USUSA president candidate interview
What makes you stand out from other candidates? Why should people vote for you?
That’s a great question. I’ve pondered this question a lot because I think it’s very important to have a qualified candidate. All of my experience has come between the business schools as well as the CHaSS school and other organizations around campus. I think what’s important is to have a candidate and a president that is diverse in thinking. He or she has been in a lot of different locations, he’s rubbed shoulders with a lot of different people, a lot of different thought, or mindsets, things like that. And so, my experience is pretty diverse, I’d say in terms of who I’ve been involved with. I’ve been involved in the entrepreneurship center which then is involved with different nonprofits, and organizations all over the world, as well as the Chinese department. I think a lot of my qualifications come from very educationally focused endeavors such as research, such as clubs trying to help people get jobs in the workforce, and things like that. So I think there’s a lot of different aspects to school events, scholars, education, research, all of that. I feel like I have a pretty diverse background in a lot of those categories.
USUSA officers receive a significant amount of responsibilities and expectation from fellow students. How do you plan to effectively take on this new role while also being a student and having your own life responsibilities?
I think one of the best ways to do that as be authentic, I’m not trying to be somebody that I’m not. I know what I’m capable of. I know what I expected of myself, and I hope that the student body can understand and expect a certain level of commitment from me. And so, I think being able to be honest with what I provide, and not trying to be somebody that I’m not, not trying to take on too many initiatives, not trying to create initiatives and platform points based off of things that I’m unaware of. So that’s why I plan to involve lots of different organizations involved lots of different people, because I think the best way to work is in groups. I think a lot of people have a lot of great ideas and can bring a lot of different things to the table. I don’t have all of the answers. And what I think I’m very good at is facilitating and being able to diversify the committee’s and allow for a lot of different new ways of thinking.
If you are not elected, how will you continue to be involved at USU?
That’s a great question. I plan to continue with the entrepreneurship center, the Chinese department, and the research project that I’m working on. We’ve done a bulk of it up until this point, but there’s a lot still to do. I have, I’d say a lot of influence and have a lot of opportunity to help within the schools that I’m at. I try to maximize that as much as possible. There are different organizations within clubs and leadership that I’m very interested in, that I have not yet had an opportunity to be a part of. And I’d love to get involved with things like the covey Leadership Fellows, other organizations within USUSA and try to stay as involved as possible because I think that’s the best way to go about college is trying to put your foot in the door in a lot of different places. And try to rub shoulders with a lot of people that are very good at a lot of different things. And so, my main thing and getting involved from the beginning was to learn from other people. And I want to continue to do that.
What is one improvement that you think USU needs? How do you plan to put action to it?
A lot of the time I think candidates come in and talk about how they want to diversify and include a lot of different people, as most of you probably can tell, I don’t fit the mold of that. But what I like I said before is I am so open to learning about new cultures. Learning new things I’ve spent time in high school, I was at a high school that had a very diverse population. I spent a semester and gone to Africa to spend time in Asia. I’ve spent time working with the refugee center here. So, I feel like I’ve gotten my foot in the door with a lot of different diverse organizations across the board. And I don’t have all the answers of how to be more inclusive. But what I do plan to do is one of my platform points is to have an initiative called conversations with the president where I sit down with leaders of different organizations, within the inclusion center, within just any organization around campus and allow them to just talk. Ask them questions about how we can help, what we can do to get more students involved with their organizations, and then give them an opportunity to voice their opinions and recommendations in their goals from within their organization. So, I plan to be a representative of the student body by being a platform that allows for these individuals that don’t seem to have as much of a voice on campus.
Who is your celebrity crush?
Oh, that’s a good question. Okay, this might take me a second. Probably Blake Lively. She’s married to Ryan Reynolds. And I think Ryan Reynolds is awesome and a great actor.
-Brielle.Carr@usu.edu