Kent State’s Undergraduate Student Government has elections Tuesday in which we encourage all students to vote through FlashLine. But we hope the next class of USG officers will do a better job of connecting with the student body than this current administration. We feel that USG is not visibly present on campus and does not advertise the good work it does.

Several student group leaders told the Daily Kent Stater for a story Monday about the disconnect they feel with their government. Many said, and we agree, that USG does not make itself visible until election season, when all of a sudden the candidates want endorsements and attention from voters and organizations. USG needs to do a better job of working year-round with clubs and interacting with students.

The problem is that USG does do useful things such as allocate money to student groups and plan events such as FlashFest, BlastOff and Study-a-Thons, but no one seems to know which organization puts these events on and allocates this money. USG even offers students free Blue Books, which are, admittedly, cheap at the University Library, but free is better than cheap.

The university seems to think pretty highly of USG’s role at Kent State. The president of USG has served on committees such as the one that chose President-elect Beverly Warren. Outgoing USG president Amish Patel was one of only two undergraduate students on that committee, so he and undergraduate student trustee Alex Evans essentially provided the voice of the entire student body to the administration.

There’s no doubt that USG should be filling an essential role at Kent State: being the student voice to the university. If USG made a bigger deal of advertising itself at the events it puts on or specifically reached out to student groups about what all it does, students might be more inclined to vote and support USG. Until USG makes itself more available, the disconnect will continue.