If there is one Associated Student Government office wheremaintaining a balance between governing and grades is crucial, it’sthe office of academic vice president.

“When you are lobbying for things that are academic in nature,you have to demonstrate you can apply yourself in that realm,”outgoing ASG President Mike Fong said, who ran for the officetwice.

But maintaining good grades is only a small part of a positionthat involves bringing students’ academic concerns to the attentionof administrators.

“(The AVP’s) overall responsibility is to keep everybodyorganized and focused on why we’re at this school, which isacademics,” said Jodi Anderson, a Weinberg sophomore and a memberof ASG’s Academic Committee. This committee is headed by theacademic vice president.

This committee works on projects dealing with financial aid,classes and major options. The complex nature of some of theseissues means it can take years for an academic vice president’sprojects to be enacted. Fong said one of the hardest parts of theacademic vice president’s job is “to be able to come up withshort-term projects while working on long-term goals that might notbe realized in your term.”

Once they have established these goals, the academic vicepresident’s job is to manage the committee’s projects and taketheir ideas to the administration by meeting with officials andserving on university committees. This makes knowing how to dealwith administrators an important part of the job, said TamaraKagel, outgoing student services vice president and former academicvice president.

“You have to be able to relate to (administrators) on aprofessional, intellectual level,” she said. “It’s not a politicalprocess with them.”

Administrators said the academic vice president serves as a linkbetween themselves and students. Associate Provost Stephen Fishersaid recent academic vice presidents have met with him weekly todiscuss issues addressed by the academic committee.

Fisher said these weekly conversation are important because”it’s an opportunity to have student voices heard and considered inweighing alternatives (and) determining priorities.”