Question

[Zillini]

The responsibilities and duties for every office including the Pres should be laid out in your I/Nat'ls manuals, operations book or what ever your org calls them.

As for my GLO, there are no restrictions on what year in school any Exec officer must be. We do require Pres candidates to have been an Exec officer the previous year. In that previous year they should have proven themselves to be: a leader, a motivator, a role model, in general learned how the Chapter is run along with policies/procedures, capable and committed. History has shown that nothing predicts future success better than past performance. (Though I'll bet many of us have seen exceptions to this.)

For this reason we strive to have officers of all ages/years in school. Having an entire Exec board of all or almost all seniors can be great with loads of experience, but the next year the Chapter can suffer because everyone is green. (Been there, done that.)

However exceptions can be made if there is a sound reason. For example I recently met a Pres from one of our Chapters who was younger and hadn't been on Exec the previous year. I later found out the reason was there had been only 2 potential candidates on Exec the previous year. One was transferring to another school and the other felt she couldn't take on that responsibility because she needed to concentrate on school. It's a challenge overcoming the lack of experience, but not impossible if the candidate and the rest of the Exec are committed.

It's been my experience that seniors are usually the better candidates for Pres for the added maturity and respect that comes along with age. Plus they should have already proven themselves as leaders and role models. But as with any election process, it depends on the individual candidate.