Q&A with Student Body President Bradley Opere on the summer

Student Body President Bradley Opere is preparing for a busy summer. Staff writer Maria Prokopowicz spoke with him about his goals, lobbying strategies and his feelings about new student orientations.

THE DAILY TAR HEEL: What are your personal goals for the summer?

BRADLEY OPERE: Setting up relationships with administrators. Every student body president has to spend that summer setting up their foundation ...

I’ll also be doing Board of Trustees meetings where I get to sit down and, as student body president, I have voting membership. It’s the highest board in the school’s administration so, once again, setting up relationships there, as well as trying to push some of the platform points.

DTH: What are some goals you have for other parts of your administration?

BO: I think one is definitely ensuring the team works well. So part of what we’ll be doing is we’ll be going out for Outward Bound; me and most of the members on the executive team. We’ll be spending at least four days in the wilderness, trying to bond ...

I’m also looking to spend some time with graduate and professional students because of everything that happened last year, and (we’ll) see if we can mend some bridges and create a better working relationship going forward ...

The other thing I think we’ll be dealing with is going for short session in Raleigh.

DTH: What is your biggest priority for students that you want to stress to legislators?

BO: I think the biggest priority is to maintain affordability. We need to ensure that we still remain the last affordable need-blind public institution that there is ... Definitely we’ll be asking a little bit of questions around the anti-discrimination bill and what that means and see how far we can get because we are definitely against it and would like to ensure that state legislatures just know how much we’re against it when we go out and talk to them this coming few months.

DTH: Have you thought about your orientation speech yet?

BO: Oh, it’s funny that you ask. It’s giving me a lot of headaches. I’m still thinking about it. I know a little bit of where it should go, but we have a draft. It’s not where I want it to be, but we have a draft.

DTH: Are you excited for all the orientations?

BO: Those will be interesting. I think it’s always great to welcome in first-years, you know ... I’m sure most of them will be adjusting to having a Kenyan student body president, so that will be something new, but also for me as well as for everyone who walks in.

So I’m looking forward to it. I think it’s going to be one of those humbling processes that just makes me love Carolina just that bit more.

DTH: Is there one thing, more than anything else, you want incoming first-years to know about UNC?

BO: I would love them to know that you can walk in here, and even though UNC is not a perfect place, you can find your voice and you can pursue your passions, and that’s just all we want from you. We don’t need anyone to stretch themselves or do things because other people think they’re special, just dig into who you are. Find yourself, and UNC has plenty of opportunities for you to do that.

DTH: Do you think you’ll ever get to take a break this summer?

BO: Hopefully I’ll be able to go home and take two weeks out just to see my family because I haven’t been there for two years, so that’s one of my top priorities. Hopefully it happens, just because I still haven’t looked at how busy the scheduling will be, but I’ll try to finagle it in some way there.

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