Art students have protested, crime-concerned policemen have spoken and now the entire LSU community is coming together to demand a change.
#fixLSU is a project with the potential to make LSU, well, fixed. I desperately want to believe this will be the final blow to our school’s shortcomings and force those in charge to listen. But the reality of the situation leaves me a little less hopeful.
The campaign lasted eight weeks, and concluded last Friday with a Free Speech Plaza table sit. That’s all. A table sit. Talk about radical reformers.
To be honest, all the buildup and blog posts led me to believe the #fixLSU end would be a bit more climactic.
We have everyone’s complaints in order — now what are we going to do about them?
It would be too easy to expect the LSU President and Student Government to listen to all our pleas and actually try to #fix them. But we know such a request is too much to ask.
So instead of playing the waiting game with the higher powers, I think it’s time for some good, old-fashioned student problem solving.
And no, to answer your question; the #fixLSU campaign was not student problem solving. It was only the base for what we have to do next.
It’s easy to put in your two cents and then be done — which is what the #fixLSU campaign asked of students — but that’s not enough.
We love to complain. That is why the campaign generated so many student responses.
Anyone can tweet or yik yak a complaint about their current frustration, but when it comes to ending that frustration, that’s where people fall off the boat. No, they jump out the boat, refusing any responsibility or involvement that could take away their beloved ability to complain.
Trust me, I would love to let myself rant about problems and then collapse back into my sofa, exhausted from constructing carefully worded complaints and generalizations. But if I’m passionate enough about something, I’ll get off my comfortably sunken-in couch and do something about it.
I wish I could say the same about University students.
Stating the obvious won’t get us anywhere. Yes, the parking problem is atrocious. Yes, the unidentified package bomb threats need to stop. But if we as students can’t come up with some realistic solutions to these problems, how can we expect anyone else to?
Never mind that there are people whose job it is to keep LSU safe and up-to-date. They obviously can’t be held accountable. Clearly, it’s time to take matters into our own hands.
If an issue can be fixed through student action, then form a focus group dedicated to it — or a group created to nag the right people until the job gets done. Either way it’s a step up from simple complaints on a WordPress account with a nifty hashtag.
But let’s be clear, the #fixLSU campaign deserves credit for uniting the student body toward a common goal. Even if that goal is just for a broad improvement of LSU, it’s at least showing onlookers that we’re fed up.
Maybe that attitude will get noticed, maybe not. It’s too soon to tell. But students are taking a small initiative that will hopefully not go unnoticed by others in charge.
Every solution has to have its start. #fixLSU is the start to a lot. It’s up to students where we take it from here.
Annette Sommers is a 19-year-old mass communication sophomore from Dublin, Calif.

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Courtesy of Alex V. Cook, Instructor, Manship School of Mass Communication

LSU President F. King Alexander speaks with the Manship School Create Lab about #FixLSU in Free Speech Alley Friday, April 25, 2014. Check out the complete slideshow.