One candidate for student vice president for student affairs wishes to focus on automating the current Student Government scholarship search process and find a scholarship for everyone at Eastern.

Justin Brinkmeyer, a senior technology education and geography major, is running independently for student vice president for academic affairs against Ronnie Deedrick, a sophomore political science major representing the Students’ Voice Party.

Brinkmeyer previously served three years on the Student Senate, including one year as chair of the senate Academic Affairs Committee, as well as serving on the Council on Academic Affairs.

“I am the candidate with experience,” he said.

Two of Brinkmeyer’s goals are to automate the scholarship search system and to get student perspective on what technology students would like to see and securing funding for that technology.

Three billion dollars in scholarship money is unclaimed every year, Brinkmeyer said, because students don’t know about the scholarships.

His idea is to plug the scholarship information into a database. The current system uses a spreadsheet, and the return process is supposed to take a week or two but has taken longer with more requests being received.

Using a database would make the process quicker and not require as many people working on it.

Brinkmeyer spent time in the military as a electronics technician, which he says gives him the ability to ask the right questions involving technology. He would like to gather the student perspective and come up with a comprehensive plan.

Another part of his plan includes obtaining additional funding for technology, such as through private donations and the state capitol. He said he has applicable experience through involvement on the Student Action Team.

Brinkmeyer said he is involved in many other facets of the academic affairs area. In addition to having two majors in different colleges, he has minors in geology, earth sciences and women’s studies.

In addition to experience on the Council on Academic Affairs, Brinkmeyer said he has served on several subcommittees that fall under academic affairs.

Through all of these involvements, Brinkmeyer said he has dealt with deans and chairs of almost every department on campus on a professional level, so he would not have to spend time building relationships.

Applications for Student Government elections are still available in the Student Activities Center and are due Wednesday. Elections are April 16 and 17.