The increased political activism and awareness this election year is not well reflected by participation in the UW’s student government. Members of the Senate have noticed that attendance at ASUW Student Senate weekly meetings has been unusually low for the past few years, but have little explanation for the trend.

The Student Senate’s purpose is to increase democratic access to the association and to provide a broad-based student forum for discussion of salient issues, according to the Senate Web site.

“Senate used to be filled and you would have to sit in the back of the room because there were no chairs to sit in,” said Gerald Corporal, ASUW director of community relations, who began attending Senate as a freshman in 2006.

However, the seats that are taken still represent a wide variety of campus groups, or constituencies.

“In terms of raw representation, we still have a number of different people from all the living groups, the RSOs [Registered Student Organizations] and the protected seats that we have,” ASUW Student Senate chair Jon Solomon said.

Students can become senators by joining an RSO — most of which have a senate seat — or through their living group. Students in on-campus housing are represented by the Residence Hall Student Association (RHSA), students in the Greek system have IFC/Panhellenic seats and those living off-campus have access to commuter seats.

There are 56 seats allocated for commuter representatives and 45 each for IFC/Panhellenic and RHSA.

Corporal and Solomon cited lower awareness and a lack of interest in ASUW as factors influencing the low turnout.

“It’s a mystery to a lot of people,” Corporal said. “When I heard of ASUW I automatically clicked, ‘Oh ASUW, ASB, same thing.’ They are the same thing, just on a larger scale.”

Student senate is important because it creates student opinion on campus, Solomon said.

The topics discussed at Senate can cover anything from creating memorials on campus, working for greener transportation or supporting or opposing proposed administrative policy changes.

ASUW is attempting to attract more students through the ASUW Ambassadors program, which launched this year. In the program, selected Freshman Interest Group (FIG) students take a six-week course on ASUW and leadership.

ASUW Senate meets each Tuesday at 5 p.m. in HUB 310. All students are welcome to attend and submit legislation, however, only members may vote, according to the Web site.

Reach reporter Sonia McBride at news@dailyuw.com.