Penn's six branches of undergraduate student government and six minority and cultural coalitions recently began a collaboration to diversify student government.
The effort was prompted by a decline in minority participation that leaders of different organizations have noticed.
Planning and Facilitating chairwoman for UMOJA - the umbrella group for black organizations - and College senior Temitope Maiyegun attributed this decline in part to the minority coalitions.
"Student groups aren't necessarily pushing for people within our community to run for student government," she said.
Maiyegun said that groups should emphasize the amount of influence a student government member can have.
Nominations and Elections Committee chairwoman and College junior Brittany Stark said increasing minority involvement is a "three-pronged" responsibility shared by minority coalitions, student government organizations and individuals.
"Unfortunately, you can't force people to join," she said.
Maiyegun said the effort to reach out needs to be made to freshmen so they will participate throughout their four years at Penn - by both running and voting in elections.
Undergraduate Assembly chairman and College and Wharton senior Wilson Tong said that many different variables could explain the smaller involvement by minorities in recent years.
One possibility, he said, is a lack of outreach.
But, "it also might be that certain students don't care" enough to run in UA elections, Tong added. "It's more difficult to get people to run for the UA if you don't have people who look like you in the body."
United Minorities Council chairwoman, Daily Pennsylvanian columnist, and College and Wharton senior Lisa Zhu agreed.
There currently aren't enough minorities on student government to reach "critical mass," she said, defining "critical mass" as "enough people . to maintain a constant population of minorities."
Women, although not technically a minority since they comprise roughly half of the undergraduate population, are also underrepresented.
Current female UA members make up five of the 24 total members - 20.8 percent - since freshmen have not yet been elected, according to Tong. That number is down from 42.4 percent in the 2005-06 academic year.
He said the majority of people who did not get elected in the spring were female.
UA member and College sophomore Grant Dubler attributed the decrease in female UA members to a higher level of "fickle competitiveness" in men.
He said that from his personal experiences, he thinks men are more willing to get up at 5 a.m. to hang up posters.
But even application-only groups like the Student Committee on Undergraduate Education have seen a similar drop in diversity.
"The under-representation is a function of the applicants who are walking through our door," said SCUE chairman and College and Wharton senior Zach Fuchs.
He said that a "more diverse pool of applicants" would "positively impact" the diversity of issues SCUE discusses.
"I hope we pull some great SCUE members . from all communities at Penn," Fuchs said.
