Auburn Brother highlighted as SGA President

Kurt Sasser, Auburn ’08, has been president of the Student Government Association for only six months, yet he has already made his mark on Auburn University and Magnolia Avenue.

The clearly marked, brightly lit crosswalks on Magnolia are partially in thanks to Sasser, the SGA and their work with the city of Auburn.

Last spring, Sasser, senior in human resources management, beat Brad Cink in a run-off with 57 percent of the vote to become the 2010-2011 SGA president.

The long road to Sasser’s presidency began before he campaigned for president or even started school at Auburn.

He said he has been an Auburn fan from day one, attending football games as far back as he can remember.

“That would be my dad’s doing,” Sasser said. “He raised me an Auburn fan, and as soon as I came out of my mom’s womb, I guess I’ve lived and breathed Auburn.”

He graduated from high school in the northwest Alabama town of Sheffield, where Auburn fans are in the minority.

“I went to a real small high school,” Sasser said. “I graduated with 16 people, and there’s probably one other guy in there that was an Auburn fan.”

After starting at Auburn, Sasser fulfilled a promise to a hometown friend to attend rush for one night, even though he had no plans of joining a fraternity.

“I came to Auburn not wanting to do a fraternity at all,” Sasser said.

After meeting some of the members, he rushed the Alpha Tau Omega fraternity, went through pledgeship and eventually served as the spirit chair.

He began his SGA career as assistant director of spirit and became increasingly involved, holding the secretary of involvement position before running for president.

“After a lot of prayer and a lot of talking to friends and talking to different people, about November of my junior year, I decided to run for SGA president,” Sasser said.

Since taking office, Sasser and the SGA have been hard at work implementing new programs and improving existing ones.

One program is the Textbook Reserve Program, an effort by the SGA, Interfraternity Council and the Ralph Brown Draughon Library.

The program stores copies of textbooks from core classes at the RBD Library, so that students can check out textbooks if they are without theirs.

The SGA has also been working on the Toomer’s Ten transit program, redesigning routes to be more efficient.

“One thing that I’ve learned since I got elected is there’s always going to be something,” Sasser said. “There’s always a problem, and there’s always something you can do better.”

The University Administration is an invaluable asset to Sasser, who said they are always willing to help and are truly concerned with students’ wants and needs.

He urges freshmen who wish to get involved with SGA to try out for Tiger Tuesdays, the SGA’s freshmen programs or to volunteer.

“Come up to our office,” Sasser said. “We always have stuff to do, whether you’re a freshman, sophomore, junior or senior. Our doors are always open. If you’re not sure what SGA is about, please just come and ask us.”

After graduation, Sasser plans to either enter the work force or continue with his education and earn his master’s in business administration.

Sasser also said he loves the state of Alabama and intends to live here, but he is considering going out of state to earn his M.B.A.