Student Trustee and senior in LAS Chime Asonye announced Wednesday night that the Urbana-Champaign campus has been granted the student trustee vote. Asonye is also the first African-American trustee to be granted the vote.

Each campus has a student trustee on the board but only one of those trustees’ votes will represent all three Illinois campuses.

“(The vote) will give us a little more leverage on the Board of Trustees,” Asonye said.

Asonye also said he supported a bill going through the senate that would change their bylaws and allow the student trustee to become a non-voting member of the senate. This gives the student trustee the ability to speak at meetings and voice an opinion, but the trustee cannot vote on senate matters.

If passed, Asonye said he would try to attend every student senate meeting or at least send a staffer in his place so he could communicate the senate’s concerns directly to the trustees.

“I think it will signal that all student trustees have an obligation to student senate,” Asonye said.

Asonye also informed senators about the student trustee Web site at studenttrustee.uiuc.edu.

This site contains Asonye’s mission statement and contact information, as well as a discussion board students can use to inform Asonye of their concerns.

Second Lt. Thomas Burnham of the University’s Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) also spoke to the student senate about the program. Students who enter the program can work in a variety of fields from law to medicine and apply for scholarships that do not require students to enroll in the military after college.

Burnham said that according to a Gallup Poll, Americans have more confidence in the military than any other institution. The ability to learn leadership skills and the guarantee of employment after graduation the ROTC offers the experience all employers are looking for, Burnham said.

“We have to be the best,” Burnham said. “Too many lives depend on it.”

The senate meets every Wednesday at 7 p.m.