Carson defines success widely

With six months under their belts, Student Body President Eve Carson and her team are confident with the strides they have made since assuming office in April.

But comparing Carson’s recorded success in her October Report to previous years is challenging because each administration tackles projects differently, which can affect how projects get accomplished.

“Eve is a visionary, and she has big ideas,” said Christie Cunningham, Carson’s senior adviser and chief of staff for last year’s president, James Allred. “We were also dreaming big last year . but we were very pragmatic in what we wanted to do.”

Almost all of Carson’s 125 platform points are mentioned in the report, which was released last week marking the halfway point in Carson’s term, but many of them have yet to move beyond the brainstorming and meeting phases.

“It requires both Eve’s ideas and the nuts and bolts,” Cunningham said, referring to the infrastructure required to get projects off the ground.

Carson started researching potential platform points last October, and in February she was confident that all her points were feasible.

But because so much of the administration’s reported success was unforeseen projects, there are still many planks to be finished.

But Student Body Vice President Mike Tarrant said despite things not being 100 percent completed, the administration is making progress.

“Just because the project isn’t done or all the funding isn’t done – we’re still having success,” he said. “A lot of these projects take time, and it’s not something that can be done in your first six months in office or 12 (months).”

Tarrant said the Carson administration is measuring success by substantial strides instead of the number of projects finished.

“From an outsider’s perspective, it’s hard to gauge the performance of any student body president,” former Student Body President Matt Calabria said. “But it’s important to look not at what’s done at any certain given time but at what’s on track to be finished.”

Calabria said he and his team tried to finish some of the smaller projects first so they would have time to focus on larger initiatives.

Both he and Allred had completed more than half their platform points by the October Report’s release.

Members of Carson’s administration have said that they are not yet halfway finished with her campaign platform, and the number of points that are completely finished to date is small.

The report is a way to reflect on the progress made but can be a difficult means to quantify the success of an administration, former Student Body President Seth Dearmin said.

“It’s subjective in a lot of ways,” he said. “There were a lot of projects that we undertook that were long-term and were really ongoing.”

But making strides on longer-term projects is sometimes just as vital as completing smaller points, Calabria said. He cited his long-term efforts to secure a free, legal music downloading system for students, which came to fruition last year.

With five months until the administration has to release its March Report, Cunningham said she thinks projects will come together.

“I think we’re at a good pace,” she said. “I know how hard it is to get things done sometimes.”

Contact the University Editor at udesk@unc.edu.