Editor’s note: This is the last in a series of five articles looking at new positions in the Government of the Student Body cabinet.

The relationship between the student governments of Iowa’s regent universities and the Board of Regents remains undefined, as those student governments have disagreed on what that relationship should entail.

A Government of the Student Body cabinet position at Iowa State created to address that question now sits vacant.

Kevin Roepke, junior in public service and administration in agriculture, who was selected to be the director of regent relations, resigned last week after having more work than he had expected when he was approved for the position.

GSB Vice President William Rock said this occurred because the student governments of the University of Iowa and the University of Northern Iowa wanted to take a more informal approach to their relationship with the Board of Regents.

Roepke declined to comment for this article.

Rock said the position was created to facilitate communication between the student governments of the University of Northern Iowa, the University of Iowa and Iowa State and to create a more formal relationship among the three when working with the Board of Regents.

“We wanted to increase the communication between the campuses, because that hasn’t been there in the past couple of years,” Rock said.

GSB has had a turbulent relationship with the regents in the past, due in part to a lack of understanding in what the board has control over concerning student interests, such as tuition and other fees, Rock said.

He said a better understanding of what the board’s role is, as well as a number of new members sitting on the Board of Regents, have allowed GSB and the other student governments to go into regent meetings with a clean slate.

The Board of Regents serves as an entity of oversight over the three universities, approves the universities’ budgets and has a certain amount of money allocated to it by the state Legislature to give to the universities.

Lindsay Schutte, president of the University of Iowa student government, said that the relationship among the student governments at Iowa State, Iowa, and Northern Iowa is much better than in previous years.

“I think it’s fantastic. For the most part, it’s great that we talk to each other and work with each other, which hasn’t always been the case,” Schutte said.

Schutte said competition between the schools’ student governments hampered their working relationship in the past.

Schutte said the three student governments hold monthly meetings and conference calls and maintain contact via e-mail.

She said the three want to work toward having a cohesive message concerning the needs of the three schools when communicating with the Board of Regents.

Schutte said she couldn’t comment about Iowa State’s regent relations position.

“I didn’t even know this position existed at Iowa State,” she said. “We don’t have a regent relations position. I deal with that.”

The student government president and vice president at the University of Northern Iowa couldn’t be reached for comment.

Rock said he will work alongside GSB President Sophia Magill and the director of government relations, Angela Groh, to communicate and work alongside the other student governments in their relations with the Board of Regents.

He said it is unclear whether a replacement will be found to fill the director of regent relations position.