Do You Want More Financial Aid? Join the Campaign!

In 2009-2010 in-state public college students borrowed over $657 million dollars to pay for college.  Students here at JMU borrowed over $46 million dollars.  That’s crazy–and these numbers are going up.  Almost all of us need help paying for college.  If you want more financial aid, sign this petition. Want the online version? Click here!

Virginia21, a college student advocacy group in Richmond that the SGA supports, is running a campaign called “What’s Your Number?” The campaign is to get students to talk about how much debt we have so we can show how much help we need.  In January, the General Assembly in Richmond is going to debate how much money the state invests in JMU, other colleges, and financial aid. Next year, the state is going to be short financial aid funding by almost $200 million.

We need as many people from JMU as possible to join the “What’s Your Number?” campaign.  Virginia21 and students from all of the colleges are going to deliver these signatures to our representatives when they are talking about the budget, so they know we need help.

Twitter Town Hall/Campaign Announcement — December 8 @ 12PM – 

To formally announce the campaign, they are going for unconventional.  Instead of a press conference, they thought to involve more people by announcing the “What’s Your Number?” over twitter.  This way  grabbing the attention of the pres,s the Governor, and other General Assembly members will happen simultaneously. Imagine if you are a reporter or an elected official and suddenly you are getting hundreds of tweets telling you to read a letter that almost 5,000 people have signed….that’ll certainly get their attention.

Here is the lists of reporters and elected officials to follow and tweet at on Dec. 8.

Want to talk to some of the other Universities involved? Here is their Twitter list.

The petition is just getting started – 

So far we are at 5,000 signers.  That’s incredible, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg of what we can do.

So many people are touched by student debt, and so many people need help paying for college.  This effort has the potential to run like crazy.  We need everybody to start talking to more people.  Here is the petition again, so print it out, take it to your classes, take it to club meetings, and everywhere.

General State Elections

Want to have your opinion heard? Want to see national problems solved? Want to be a part of the change, but don’t know how?

Elections for your House Representative are happening NEXT WEEK! Since you will be at JMU, though, you have to vote through an ABSENTEE BALLOT.

1) Check if you are already registered to vote. If you are a Virginia Resident, you can check here
2) Find your state’s Absentee Ballot form online. If you are a Virginia Resident go to
3) Print it out and fill it out
4) Look on Page 2 of that document, and look for which county you are in. Mail your form to the address listed under your county.
5) Mail it, or fax it, by NOV. 1 (this Tuesday)
6) Check the status of your absentee ballot at under “Absentee”

CONGRATULATIONS! You have made a difference!

(If you have not registered to vote, visit your state DMV so that you can be registered to vote by the next election which is presidential)

The General State Elections are on Nov 8th and here is a link to apply for an absentee ballot. Ballots must be sent by mail by Tuesday Nov 1st. Here is the link for Virginia Voters

Other states can be found on this website

Check out the Facebook event for more info as well.

E-Campus is Now MyMadison

To register for spring 2012 classes, students will now log on to MyMadison, a new platform that personalizes content to you and provides accurate and consistent advising and registration information in a single site  to help you locate information more readily without having to know the structure of the university and its many departments.

 

MyMadison retains all the functionality of e-campus and incorporates important academic advising information, including an academic requirement report where you can see your progress towards satisfying graduation requirements and find your cumulative and major GPA.

 

Why MyMadison?

Single log on to MyMadison and your Student Center Integration of advising information along with your student center, Quick view of your academic requirements with a link to the full report showing your cumulative and major GPA, Quick view of your course schedule by current date and links to important advising information

 

Spring 2012 Class Registration

Monday, October 24^th: Spring Class offerings and registration appointments available

Monday, October 31^st: Registration for spring 2012 begins via MyMadison

 

How do I register for Classes?

Log on to MyMadison

Click on the Advising Tab

Select Student Center and Register for classes

 

Check out the new MyMadison Tutorial 

 

Give us your feedback: The Student Government Association is collecting student feedback about the new MyMadison, so check out their YouTube presentation:

You can tweet (@SGAjmu) Facebook, or use this very blog post.