The Lion Icon statue recently revealed on Missouri Southern’s Oval was funded partly by Student Senate, which donated $40,000 to its development.

According to Noah Triplett, Student Senate president, the Student Senate budget is made up of the Student Activity Fee. This fee is paid by all students enrolled at Southern. It is $25 for full-time students and $15 for part-time and summer students.

As this fee is based on student enrollment, the gains made by Student Senate vary around an estimated $15,000 per year, according to Triplett.

According to Molly Schumaker, Student Senate secretary, Student Senate’s budget can only be used to improve campus for students. This includes events, services and aesthetics.

“We had rollover funds, almost 100K, and we really hadn’t made that big of an impact on campus,” said Triplett. “We wanted something that could make the school a better place, but also we could put our name on.”

According to Schumaker, the names listed on the statue’s plaque are every Student Senate member who served during the 2012-2013 school year. She believes that the number of names is excessive, but explained that a past member deserved to be noted.

“The only other controversy would have been how do we put Johnathan [Saunders] on there because he was so instrumental in doing it, and what happened was unfortunate, but we believed that he needed to be put on there,” said Schumaker. “Basically, we were in a process of going over our bylaws, and in that process things got messed up and he ended up resigning … He only served during the first semester, which was when we actually passed the bill.“

“If someone served on the committee for just a couple of months and they didn’t see their name on the plaque, we didn’t want to have any complaints,” said Triplett.

Student Senate vice president Brittany Lampe sees the statue as a commemoration of all students, not just those involved in Student Senate.

“Everyone pays in the Student Activities Fee, so it says that Student Senate helped fund the project, but in reality all the students helped fund it,” said Lampe. “A piece of it is for each of us.”