Huskies on the Hill

University of Washington students were invited to join ASUW and GPSS leaders on January 29th as they challenged our state legislative system with current affairs. This event, dubbed Huskies on Hill, provided UW students the opportunity travel to Olympia and lobby on behalf of student issues. Planning for this event began in early December, which allowed the ASUW Office of Government Relations to assemble community members who were willing to bring forth a conversation with their legislators about how to better support issues regarding their higher education experience. These topics included tuition and textbook costs, mental health resources, sexual assault protections, and disability inclusion and accessibility on campus.

Through word of mouth, social media, and physical posters, the Office of Government Relations was able to recruit 150 students to join their lobbying efforts. Partnering with the Tacoma and Bothell campuses increased the total amount of participants and united the University of Washington community under a common cause. With that many individuals comes an immense amount of logistical planning, as 97 individual meetings were set up to ensure the face to face communication between UW students and legislative officials. When asking Kalani Tissot, the Legislative Programming Coordinator, about his favorite aspect of the event, he shared that it was “providing students an opportunity to meet with the Governor and Lieutenant governor of Washington.” The opportunity has given UW students a voice and a platform to change our community for the better.