The Student Government Association at Ferris State announced that Bradley Lardie would take over as president for the 2026-27 academic year.
English Education junior Bradley Lardie has been a member of SGA for one year and plans to use this new position to serve as the voice between the student body and campus administrators.
What do you hope to achieve throughout your presidency?
Throughout my presidency, I want to make campus lively and fun again. I want to keep that feeling that you get when you come back to campus those first couple of weeks in the fall. I want to keep that and extend it throughout the school year, so I want to be able to host more events and get people connected to both student government, but also President Pink. While I was campaigning, I had a lot of people come up to me and they found out that student government is able to talk to Dr. Pink and meet with him. What I gather is that a lot of the student body wants to meet with Dr. Pink, and they also want to have events that are at a timely time. I have had some people who are commuters be like, ‘Oh yeah, these events are being hosted around like 7 or 8 p.m., and I am already home and live an hour away. I’m not going to come back for that.’ So just maybe hosting those around more convenient times, but also some earlier ones, so that way we get a variety of people to make campus lively, and also just connect people with student government and Dr. Pink.
Do you have any plans in mind already as you prepare for the next school year?
Yeah, so again, just hosting a myriad of events. We started this tradition of sorts called the week of professionalism that we do around October time. We have a week where we do different events, like this year, we did an elevator pitch, where you pitch yourself to a panel of judges and they score you based on a certain criteria. People can win some prizes from that, and we also did a professional bingo, and kind of bringing that back because it had a good reception. Obviously, pancakes with the president. People love that, and I know Dr. Pink loves that. This coming year, for The Big Event, I hope to crack 1000 volunteers again. That’s something we haven’t been able to do since before COVID,[the pandemic], so that is my goal to impact as much as the Big Rapids area as possible.
What inspired you to run for this position?
It was one of those things where not a lot of people were willing to step up for it. It came time for the presidential elections to start coming up, and no one was really stepping up for it, so Maddy Nunn, who is my vice president, we kind of looked at each other and thought we should just do it. We are both very passionate about the school, and we are both very involved in different clubs and on campus jobs, so we see everyday students day in and day out. I felt that we are best to see these kinds of students and help them out. So what really kind of inspired me is just the feeling that this is something that I am passionate about and something I could be good at.
Are there any challenges you anticipate facing while taking over this position?
We have a lot of people graduating and stepping down, so just making sure that we’re filling the cabinet with people who are passionate and as passionate as we are about this. It takes a lot of effort to do these events that we’re putting on. Especially if we want to host The Big Event on the scale that I hope to. Making sure that all nine members are willing to put in as much as they can into it. Also, just filling back up the general assembly with people. We have a lot of general assembly members also graduating this year, so just getting students in. We’re starting to talk to deans of different colleges across campus, hoping to get into their FSUS classes to try and get some freshmen involved with student government, so that they can be there for a couple of years, maybe even four full years.
Do you have any plans for the current student government funds?
So we’re kind of on the down low right now. We just finished The Big Event, and that was one of our biggest things. The next thing we have planned is our final meeting, end-of-the-year banquet, and the inauguration. We also have SGA stoles, so that we could give away to our seniors and those who are walking during graduation. That is where our current money is going. In terms of next year, we’re going to get roughly $16,000. It all depends; every student pays $1.50 into student government as a part of their tuition. So in the fall, we’ll get roughly $16,000 from that. That money is going to go towards those previous events I had mentioned, as well as the cabinet scholarships. Cabinet members do get scholarships because we put in a lot of work into these kinds of things, taking up time from our own time of the day to do this. Including this interview, this is the fourth hour I’ve already put into this day for student government stuff. In terms of other things to do with the money, this year, we have talked about putting massage chairs into the DEC; however, we have been having a little bit of trouble finding ones that aren’t going to totally break our bank. There used to be massage chairs in the DEC, just for context, and our advisors let us know that students used those things until they wore out, and we believe that it could be a purchase that students would like to use.
How do you plan to get student government’s name out there?
Getting into those FSUS classes at every college possible will really help. I believe that we’re building up a very diverse cabinet right now. We have people who are in dentistry, business, and even engineering, so these are like different colleges and schools that we’re able to have somebody who knows those students go into those FSUS classes because there is that connection there. But then, we can also do a lot of tabling events. Tabling is a free resource, and so it would be asking cabinet members and general assembly members to take, like, an hour out of their day to do a table. That and also bringing back coffee with the cabinet on the first Monday of every month. We will buy students coffee at the local Starbucks in the DEC, and they can chat with us and ask questions about student government.
What else do you want students, staff and administrators to know about you or SGA?
I want them to know that student government is here for them. You know, I feel like people just don’t really know that the student government exists or what they can do for you. While I was campaigning, I spent a night with my friends out on campus, and we covered campus in chalk. A lot of people were like, ‘What’s going on? What’s that? What Student Government?’ So, letting them know that it is a thing. We’re here for clubs, we’re here for individual students and we’re here for everybody who needs help. And we’re literally looking for things to support right now, so if you have an issue, come to us. We will help you out. I just want them to know that we are willing to go and do whatever it takes because we have people in student government willing to do whatever it takes to help solve their issue or point them in a direction to help you solve that issue.
For more information regarding SGA, please refer to their page on Ferris 360.