The Student Government Association at SUNY Cortland is having this week, April 8-10, the voting for the election of their 2025 – 2026 officers’ board.
The campaign has been happening since March 24th and has reached a great number of students since then. For a few weeks now, the candidates had the chance to speak about their involvement with SGA, their plans, goals and why the student body should consider them for their applied position.
Parker Murphy Arenas, who is a junior and a Criminology Major, with a Minor in Forensic Psychology and Communications, is one of the candidates for the position of President.
With his “Why start fresh when you can start strong!” campaign slogan, and being inspired by Abraham Lincoln, who “fought for something morally right, even when it created a great divide and resulted in great criticism. He had a goal that bettered society and did not stop until that goal was met,” said Arenas, the President candidate said that if elected, he plans on hiring a strong cabinet base, with whom we would immediately start working on building club attendance through the use of orientation programs and COR 101, as well as prepare SGA and all clubs for the Corey renovation (happening at the beginning of 2026), and will focus on SGA’s social media following, by creating more opportunities on the Instagram for student engagement.
“I want to be SGA President because I want the ability to lead a group that I know has the power to make change and better the lives of the student body, said Arenas. “I believe I am the best candidate because in the last two years, I have been able to learn from my work in my two different positions, but also the work of the other 18 cabinet members I have worked with to truly understand the inner workings, successes, and failures of SGA.”
Arenas has been working in SGA since his sophomore year, when he was hired as a secretary. Arenas said that at the time, he saw in the position an opportunity to give back and improve the community that had welcomed and supported him since his first joined the SUNY Cortland community. Currently he is the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of SGA, where he is in charge of providing training to all club officers; he oversees all purchases clubs make, ensuring they comply with all of SGA’s financial policies; works to allocate 25,000 in contingency funds, leading the allocation of a one-million-dollar budget across multiple departments and student-run clubs.
Arenas has also held the position of Research Assistant with chair of the Soc/Crim department, and Anna Curtis COR 101 Student Facilitator.