The Missouri Students Association presidential election will be open for voting from noon on March 4 to midnight on March 6.

Only one slate, MizzouMomentum, will be running for the position. Presidential candidate Logan Kuykendall and vice presidential candidate Kaylie Lineback’s campaign focuses on progress, advocacy, wellness and sustainability.

Student Finances

The MizzouMomentum slate plans to have conversations with the University of Missouri’s Faculty Council on University Policy to encourage the use of free resources in curriculums, such as Open Educational Resources, a website that offers free textbooks and lectures.

“If there’s one hill I will die on, it is that I am not paying for a textbook,” Kuykendall said.

The slate also plans to increase the visibility of tuition bills. MU currently offers a net price calculator to help incoming first-year and transfer students estimate the cost to attend the university and presents a cost-breakdown of an enrolled student’s tuition bill. According to Kuykendall, however, the specific details of payments other than tuition can be difficult to understand.

“Most people don’t even know that we have a student financial success office,” Kuykendall said. “The capacity [of loans and scholarships] that are offered within student financial aid resources are very limited outside of ScholarshipUniverse.”

The slate plans to work with the university to communicate general tuition changes to the student body.

Campus Standing Committees Overhaul

The slate plans to reexamine MU’s Campus Standing Committees. According to Kuykendall, the committees are meant to unite students, faculty and administrators under a common topic like artificial intelligence or student affairs. However, Kuykendall said he believes that the results of these meetings have not been accessible and timely. Some committees have yearly reports from the last academic year, like the Library Committee, but none have recent minutes publicly accessible. The slate wants to increase the committees’ communication with the student body, potentially through monthly updates on social media.

Americans with Disabilities Act Compliance

Kuykendall and Lineback are looking to ensure MU compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act by recognizing the Disability Center and its evaluations. According to Lineback, the center has had discussions with MU faculty and staff, but it has felt frustration with not being heard. The slate is not planning to take over the process, but would instead facilitate conversations between the center, students and the appropriate administrators.

However, in a Dec. 9 interview with The Maneater, current MSA Vice President Emily Brockmann said that there were few concerns raised between disability groups on campus and MSA in the 2024 fall semester.

“I think [first] semester has been really busy and hectic for everyone on campus, and honestly I don’t know if there’s been a ton of issues that they’ve really needed help or support with at this time,” Brockmann said.

Transportation Reframing

MizzouMomentum also plans to facilitate conversations around making student transportation more accessible. According to the slate, transportation to and from campus is unreliable and inconvenient. Kuykendall said that he remembers being a first-year student and missing the bus because his meetings ended too late.

“It was literally faster for me to walk home from the Hearnes Center than it was for me to wait for the bus,” Kuykendall said.

The slate wants to have conversations with the City of Columbia and MU Parking to try and make transportation and parking more accessible for all students, including those who require paratransit services.

STRIPES and MizzouSafe

According to Kuykendall, fluctuations in usage have made the STRIPES program, an auxiliary of MSA, difficult to fund consistently. The program, which allows students to get a $12 stipend for late-night rides through the ride-sharing service Uber, began in 2001 as a group of volunteers driving and fielding calls fully supported by MSA. But, according to Kuykendall, liability insurance and COVID-19 led the association to find a different model. 

MSA switched to a partnership with Uber in 2023, but the association’s budget is difficult to accommodate fluctuating usage. The slate plans to look to outside sources such as the Office of Academic Affairs or the City of Columbia for funding to stabilize the rapid changes. 

The slate also wants to evaluate Mizzou Safe and potentially reimagine its design. The app currently provides students with a collection of safety services such as 911, text support and an interface to report a crime. Kuykendall said that he believes Mizzou Safe’s current interface and user experience make the app difficult to navigate for students. Kuykendall wants to use student feedback to work with the MU Division of Information Technology to market the app and make it more accessible to students.

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Protections

The slate also wants to assess current DEI protections at the university, following the dissolution of the Inclusion, Diversity and Equity division at MU in July 2024 and recent cuts to student research funding that include subject matter involving DEI.

“I think it’s important that we do advocate against certain disparities, especially when it comes to DEI,” Lineback said. “I know a lot of people in Senate are freaking out because a lot of them have research positions, so just being able to advocate on their behalf, because I do think it’s important whether or not we can change the law to at least stand up for what is right.”

The slate would like to reinstate recurring meetings between MSA, Graduate Professional Council, Legion of Black Collegians, Associated Students of the University of Missouri and Missouri International Student Council. According to Kuykendall, previous meetings between these groups ended after rapidly changing MSA members and COVID-19 made communication more difficult.

“There’s a lot of disconnect, which is crazy when we all go to the same university,” Kuykendall said. “We all want the same thing for everyone. Let’s make sure we can do that together with a unified voice.”

Emergency Housing

The slate also wants to help establish emergency housing on campus, which would give students in need a temporary room. They would look to residential halls and the City of Columbia while communicating with MU Care Team’s Basic Needs coordinator to try and find short-term places for students to stay.

“There are student populations who do face homelessness on this campus, and [we want to] make sure that we, as students, in our current capacity for MSA, are doing what we can to ensure that there are students with a bed and a warm place to stay,” Kuykendall said.

Expanding Support of Emergency Packs

MizzouMomentum intends to continue supporting and expanding its auxiliary functions, especially Tiger Pantry’s Emergency Food Packs system. This program is supposed to provide students with a bag filled with two to three microwaveable meals and snacks. However, according to Lineback, the packs typically include a few snacks, a can of green beans and a pack of packaged noodles. The slate would look to better the nutrition and quantities of food in the emergency packs and make them more accommodating to each student in need.

“It just comes down to nutritional value, calorie value and the quantity that we’re providing, because we’re very limited in our current capacity with how it’s broken down in our current MSA budget,” Kuykendall said. “But there is more internally that we can be doing to provide for Tiger Pantry, both logistically and financially.”

The slate plans to increase support for other food pantries on campus unaffiliated with Tiger Pantry, according to Kuykendall.

“One of the main things, especially when it comes to breaking down the stigma of going to a food pantry, is meeting students where they are,” Kuykendall said.

Hygiene and Wellness

The slate also wants to expand access to menstrual products in bathrooms and at the Tiger Pantry through collaboration with external organizations, including the The Period Project and Period Law.

MizzouMomentum also wants to look for period products that last longer and are more useful than the current Aunt Flow options on campus. The slate would also like to organize more hygiene drives through the association and Tiger Pantry.

Administrative Sustainability

According to Kuykendall, navigating the expansive student resources at MU can be difficult.

“Students actually are really good about using university resources,” Kuykendall said. “There’s a lot, which is great, and I’m thrilled that the university can provide where we can to help, but it can be almost overwhelming … So it’s maybe going to be those intentional conversations with those different offices around campus to say, ‘What has worked best for you guys?’”

In reflecting on the previous administration, Kuykendall and Lineback emphasized this “intentionality” within their communication.

“I think their Achilles’ heel has just been that intentional conversation, both [between] the student body and between the branches,” Kuykendall said.

Environmental Sustainability

Environmental sustainability is also a concern for MizzouMomentum. Kuykendall said that they initially plan to address this issue with an advisory board and an Executive Sustainability Coordinator, but the slate is also examining long-term solutions for environmental sustainability. They said one of the potential options could be reinstating the Environmental Affairs and Sustainability Committee, which last met in 2018 and was in charge of providing plans for environmental sustainability to the vice chancellor of operations and chief operating officer. Additionally, Kuykendall and Lineback have suggested plans to re-integrate the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System, which was a self-reporting program to measure college environmental sustainability and was last used by MU in 2018.

Upcoming MSA Election Events

The MSA election forum will be held on March 3 at 5 p.m. in Jesse Wrench Auditorium in Memorial Union. Students can submit questions for consideration here.
Ballots may be cast through an MU Engage survey that will go live at 6 a.m. March 4 and end March 6.

Edited by Maya Dawson | mdawson@themaneater.com
Edited by Natalie Kientzy | nkientzy@themaneater.com
Edited by Emilia Hansen | ehansen@themaneater.com
Edited by Annie Goodykoontz | agoodykoontz@themaneater.com