It is official: Mike Goodman and Frank Sasso are the new heads of the Undergraduate Student Government. This makes them the voice of the entire undergraduate body at Ohio State. We hope the two of them will start making changes around the university that have long been ignored.

One of the main issues that many of the other USG presidential teams ran on was renovating the Ohio Union. Basically, they said Ohio State’s union is pathetic compared to most others. At one point in time, OSU had the premier union in the entire country – now it pales in comparison to Columbus State’s union.

Nobody wants to go to the Ohio Union any more for any reason other than to eat. It is falling apart – there is abestos, wiring and plumbing problems are rampant, vermin have free reign of some of the lower floors, and it also has severe structural problems.

The union has countless rooms that could be used for studying, group meetings or any number of other things. The ballrooms get used, but that is because they are the only inexpensive rooms of that size on campus. Even they are not that high quality.

One USG presidential candidate team, Chris Bolte and Matt Straka, had an interesting solution to solving the union problem. A large part of the reason behind the nonexistence of union renovations is money – or OSU’s lack of it – so this team decided that getting money from a corporate sponsor would be a good fix. While most people are hesitant about the FedEx Ohio Union, it would be well worth it if that meant having a gathering place for students that was more than a hole with several rotating restaurant chains.

In their campaign, Goodman and Sasso said one of the main objectives of their reign in student government would be improving the quality of student life around campus. Many of the points in their plan were laudable goals – like having a meal plan in off-campus restaurants – but would not be very good in practice. However, renovating the Ohio Union or creating an entirely new one is an achievable goal that would have a longstanding effect on the university – especially the everyday lives of students.