Sitting behind his desk in the Student Government Association (SGA) office is senior Sean Burkett undergrad faculty member. In April 2017 Burkett was elected president of SGA and while it is difficult to get a lot accomplished as president in only one year, Burkett is particularly proud of the role he and the other SGA members played creating a safer campus.
Growing up in Michigan, Burkett began his studies at the University of Missouri-St. Louis in 2014. What drew him to UMSL were the programs being offered. Burkett found that the criminology and psychology programs offered at UMSL were among the highest ranked in the country. This motivated him more because of his aspirations of a career in law enforcement and provided him the opportunity
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It wasn’t until his sophomore year when he was introduced to the president and vice president of the organization while a resident assistant at Oak Hall.
“I never really showed much interest in SGA but then I joked around one day that maybe I would run for comptroller,” Burkett said.
His friends encouraged him to run for the position and with their support; Burkett ran and was elected to the position of comptroller.
After winning the election of the comptroller, Burkett quickly realized he had higher goals.
“Not even a month into that job, I knew I wanted to be president of SGA,” he stated. “I knew that I wanted to do something more than budgets, I wanted to actually really make a difference on this campus.”
Burkett began his campaign to run for president after the end of his first year in SGA.
His campaign was successful, and Burkett became president of SGA his senior year.
As president, Burkett is active on the Chancellors Board, the Chancellors Council, and meets with administration regularly to advocate for the students of
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This is a position he does not take lightly. While the SGA constitution requires ten hours of office and/or meeting time per week, Burkett nearly doubles that. In addition to daily meetings with various faculty, students, and campus organizations, Burkett makes it a point to respond to every email he receives from students the day they are received; some days there are 40 or more. With the responsibilities of the student government president he still finds time to manage his studies and social