The Board of Visitors’ Student Affairs and Athletics Committee met Thursday to discuss the importance of student self-governance and to express support for members of the University’s athletic community.
Patricia Lampkin, vice president for student affairs, began the meeting by speaking about student self-governance within University student organizations and how it allows engaged students to deal with the frustrating “messy realities” of leadership.
“We don’t automatically relieve them of that frustration,” she said. “We think there is much to be learned in that phase of leadership … The freedom to create and develop, and sometimes to fail, is fundamental to student self-governance.”
Three University student leaders — Haider Arshad, a fourth-year Commerce student and trustee; Katherine Sadowsky, a third-year Batten student and president of Imagine U.Va.; and Evan Behrle, a fourth-year College student and Honor Committee Chair — all echoed Lampkin’s support for student self-governance, drawing on their own experiences.
“The benefits of student self-governance is so obvious and so difficult to understate,” Behrle said. “There is something communitarian about the whole project — about the endowment of this responsibility in the student body even as older students leave and new students come in.”
The focus soon shifted from student self-governance to the success of the tennis team, which recently recorded the program’s first national title under head coach Brian Boland. The team recorded its 100th straight ACC victory last year and has not dropped below three in the national rankings in more than eight years.
“It’s not about one person,” Boland said. “It takes a village to achieve anything of greatness. It started from the top, and I’ve had that support from the day I’ve arrived from Craig [Littlepage] and my supervisor Jon Oliver.”
Athletic Director Craig Littlepage touched on the successes of the men’s and women’s soccer team this fall, as well as those of the cross country team. He also defended head football coach Mike London, who is in the midst of a seven game losing streak this season, and confirmed his earlier public remarks that London will be coaching next season.
“With football, obviously it’s been a challenging year,” he said. “But I remain very, very confident in Mike London and the rest of the entire coaching staff. The team continues to work hard, recruiting is continuing to hold up, and I promise we will get our football program on track.”
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