Carlsbad High’s student council is not particularly well-known around campus. Nevertheless, with campaigns set to kick off in just a few months, freshman Patrick Mason, an aspiring councilman, breaks down some key aspects of the organization.

Lancer Link: When can you campaign for student council?

Patrick Mason: I don’t know dates, but [campaigning] is early spring, the actual election is probably around later spring. So you’re going to have a good couple months to campaign, a couple months to get your voice out there.

LL: What are the positions in the student council?

PM: Well, it varies what grade you’re in. So for freshmen right now, you can run for sophomore student council, and from what I know it’s just president and vice president. And then if you’re a sophomore right now you’d run for junior [council].

LL: Does the student council impact the student body?

PM: Absolutely. The student [council] and the positions have a great role in making the school better. What I believe it’s most about is getting [the] school’s name out there, deciding on how to promote the school, designing on different projects like Homecoming and different events like Winter Formal, getting more club participation [and] matters of that hand.

LL: What kind of decisions does the student council make?

PM: There’s a lot of things that you could push for that you might not have the power to [do]. There’s some decisions you can make, just more minor decisions. You could sway and influence speaker decisions if you wanted to do that.

LL: Does the student council have meetings?

PM: The student council has meetings, [and] if you wanted to propose a big change, I’d advise talking to the man who runs it all in the 5000 building. You’re gonna have meetings with people [that] you’re going to work around [and] you’re going to meet a lot of people.

LL: What goes into a student council campaign?

PM: First what you need to do is you get the media to get your name out there. You need to work with people; you need to meet with people that you might not even know or people you might not be too familiar with. You need to talk to them [and] you need to express what you want to do and what the goals of your campaign are. You don’t really need to get a campaign team, but you need some friends to come help you out. And then second, as I said, when the time comes after February, you can try to land yourself some interviews, try to get your name out there, and try to get more expressed on Lancer Link or CHSTV. But what I would recommend the most is just a face to face interaction with a person, you get to understand what they actually want from a candidate.

LL: What responsibilities do student council members have?

PM: In all honesty, the positions where you’re a junior probably have much more responsibility than positions when you’re running as a freshman. There’s a lot of positions that are just kind of leadership positions, and I would assume that then there’s kind of more positions, like the Treasury, where you have something that you need to do and something that you’re going to set out to do. It’s like [the] Treasury getting budgets for certain events, but it’s a mix of just policy positions and leadership positions.

LL: Why should students participate in the student council?

PM: [The] more students being able to express their opinions and express their beliefs, the better, because we get to have a more concrete understanding about what the students want and how to get that from the students.

LL: What do you think makes a good student council member?

PM: To be a student councilman, you normally have to put the policies in place, you need to be a representative, and you need to be a leader for your community. It kind of depends on what position you’re running for, but in general: honesty, integrity, and leadership.