The call of free food and thundering music provided by campus radio station KURE lured close to 1,000 students in to “meet their government,” although students left with varying levels of knowledge on who their representatives are or what they do.

The Government of the Student Body drew crowds of students in front of Curtiss Hall on Central Campus Thursday afternoon for Meet Your Government Day. Students were served free hamburgers, chips, cookies and Coca-Cola products, courtesy of GSB.

Kari Hoefer, GSB chief of staff, said GSB uses this event to provide students the opportunity to meet their GSB representative and voice their opinions over issues to their elected officials.

“[Meet Your Government Day] is the easiest way to reach students and inform them of what GSB is doing for them and to receive feedback from them,” Hoefer said. “This event really helps us to get students’ opinions on issues and the actions GSB is taking and has taken.”

However, a number of those 1,000 students said they didn’t know who represents them or what GSB does.

“I don’t really know what they do. I just know they’re the student body,” said William Wunsch, graduate student in sociology. “I couldn’t tell you one thing they’ve done this year.”

Wunsch said he doesn’t know who the senator is on GSB who represents him and other graduate students or who the GSB president is.

Wunsch suggested GSB post fliers in the Memorial Union and publish a newsletter to better inform students of what GSB is doing.

“I haven’t really seen anything saying, ‘These are your representatives. These are the people to contact,'” he said.

“It’s a huge problem. This is our student body government. If students are to have a voice on campus, it should be through the student government. If students don’t know who to contact or know what they do, how can they have a voice?”

Wunsch said events like Meet Your Government Day are an excellent way to inform and reach students, but more needs to be done.

“I think a lot of students have misconceptions about GSB, but that’s what this is for. It’s for students to see that GSB is on campus working for them,” said GSB President Mike Banasiak. “It’s our job to reach out to students, and we can always do a better job.”

He said it bothers him that students don’t know who he or any other official on GSB is, but that fact only means GSB needs to work harder.

“It just motivates us even more,” Banasiak said.

Not all the students who attended felt they were uninformed.

“We feel our needs are being met,” said Todd Sondag, senior in mechanical engineering.

Sondag and six other mechanical engineers who attended the event said they have been well-informed on GSB issues by Engineering Senator Leia Guccione.

“[Guccione] has been pretty vocal in the classroom. She talks about GSB issues to engineering students; she encourages them to attend [GSB] meetings and attends Engineering Student Council meetings and gives updates and reports on what GSB is doing,” said Jesse Bernstein, senior in mechanical engineering.

Bernstein, Sondag and their friends said they haven’t attended GSB meetings despite being encouraged to attend.

Student attendance at Wednesday senate meetings is sparse.

“Students are reluctant to attend GSB meetings because it might out of their way or not fit into their schedules. But with this event, we can come to them instead of them coming to us,” Hoefer said.

James Ploen, sophomore in psychology, said it’s not necessarily GSB’s fault a majority of students are uninformed about GSB.

“They could do more, but I also could do more. I think it’s my job as a student to find out more,” Ploen said. “It’s one of those things you know you should do, but I know I, and probably a lot of other students, just get lazy and don’t get around to it.”

In an effort to see how GSB can better reach and inform students, senators and cabinet members handed out surveys and Story County voter registration forms for students to fill out as they waited in lines to receive food. This is the first time surveys have been provided to students in the two years the event has been done, Hoefer said.

“These surveys enable us to receive more student feedback than we normally do, and that feedback is crucial because it gives us an idea of what we need to do differently to benefit students, as well as the things we are doing right, which we need to continue.”

Hoefer said responses from students on how to better inform them has led GSB to work on updating its Web site to include online forums, surveys and polls to allow students to more easily voice their opinions and concerns to GSB leaders. She said the student body is also looking into creating a newsletter to post on its Web site.

Brandi Rodenburg, sophomore in exercise and sport science, said college students want their information quickly and they want to know if they agree with a stance right away.

“Most students aren’t going to go on the Web site to look things up,” Rodenburg said.