UT Student Government leaders attended the SEC Exchange this year in Starkville, Mississippi, from July 16-19. The exchange brought together student governments from across the Southeastern Conference to collaborate and discuss initiatives and solutions to common university-wide issues.

The annual SEC Exchange is held to build community among the colleges in the conference. Each year, the host college changes; this year Mississippi State University hosted, featuring social gatherings, breakout meetings and presentations from each school. MSU administrators hosted a panel about building credibility and influence as leaders.

“The SEC has the craziest rivalry… it’s always prevalent, and so getting to see that pushed aside for the common goal of serving our students and what we care about … that’s the benefit of every SEC Exchange every year,” said MSU Student Association President Keegan Figueroa, who helped organize the event.

The SEC, founded as an athletic conference in 1933, currently consists of 16 universities across the South, including UT’s rivals the University of Oklahoma and Texas A&M. 

Last year, UTSG hosted the exchange on the UT campus, its first exchange after joining the SEC in 2024. After the event, the former executive alliance of Hudson Thomas and Thierry Chu rewrote the SG Constitution to align it with other SEC student governments.

This year, the agenda consisted of breakout meetings based on student government positions, tours of sights around MSU and various speeches and panels, including a speech from Charlie Hussey, the deputy commissioner and COO of the SEC. Each school gave presentations on student government accomplishments from the past year and discussed future plans during an “Idea Exchange.” 

“Student governments are using (the exchange) to share successful initiatives and compare governmental structures in a way that I don’t think was happening previously,” UTSG Vice President Jaden Watt said. “It allows for not only ideas to manifest and grow like seeds being planted in different parts of the SEC, but it also allows for collaboration between those schools.”

UTSG’s Idea Exchange presentation was titled “Building Bigger than your Campus” and focused on two of SG’s accomplishments from last year: creating digital student IDs and the launching of the Builder’s Bullpen — a showcase for entrepreneurs and founders in Austin to meet and share ideas with the UT community. 

UTSG President Kiera Dixon and Watt said they wanted to focus on problems centered both within the UT community and in the broader Austin community, like food insecurity. They also gave the other college representatives the opportunity to share issues their schools are facing and spent time brainstorming solutions. 

The Executive Alliance said that for the 2026-2027 school year, they hope to discover ways to better engage the UT community and minimize student apathy with SG. They hope to grow events like the Red River Rivalry Food Fight in collaboration with the UT Outpost and place a larger emphasis on the first-year representative election in the fall. 

“We also found out that, not only are a lot of the schools facing similar problems, but also some schools already have different ideas or foundations set that can be implemented across schools,” Dixon said. “It was really successful, and we were glad that we had the opportunity to do that.”

Watt said the SEC Exchange developed into a networking event, and they want to continue to collaborate with other SEC schools throughout the year. 

“Our place is definitely not only solidified in the SEC, but we’re excited to be in it and they’re excited to have us,” Watt said. “We definitely fit in this conference.”