By Danielle Bonior
An unusual stillness has taken hold inside the walls of Silliman University, where student activism once stirred under election parties of old.
This school year, during the filing of candidacies for the Silliman University Student Government (SUSG), a curious trend emerged: several top positions, including the college governor and vice governor seats, had a lack of takers, a lack of opposition.
The SUSG, long considered a training ground for leadership and public service, now faces a shrinking pool of candidates—the same reality for many colleges within SU. For students watching from the sidelines, it raises an important question: Where have our leaders gone?
Some trace it to fatigue—emotional, academic, even existential. Others cite the increasing demands of college life. “It’s not that we don’t care,” one student shared anonymously. “It’s just… it doesn’t feel like it matters anymore.”
And, unfortunately, political apathy doesn’t stop at the campus gates. Ask students about national or local elections; many admit they’ve never registered to vote. “Why register when the outcome is always the same?” seems to be the overall sentiment.
Political participation or activism are even equated to increased stress, a comfortable excuse for students to entirely remove themselves from the conversation because “studyante raman gud ta”—sharing how, apparently, we are in school exclusively to learn our specializations, and that does not involve political growth.
Disengagement is neither exclusive to Silliman nor entirely new. Across the country, student governments in other universities have likewise reported low turnout, fewer candidates, and declining voter engagement. What used to be lively platforms for advocacy now struggle to fill rosters. When asked why they chose not to run, students on online forums described the SUSG as “performative” or “weak to cause change.”
Additionally, political data from the Commission on Elections (COMELEC) shows that many young people—those aged 18 to 24—skip voter registration entirely. It’s a slow drift from civic participation that mirrors what’s happening on campus: disillusionment with systems that no longer feel empowering.
Behind the apathy lies complexity. This isn’t laziness, nor a lack of interest. It’s resignation, the acceptance of a “predetermined outcome”: a symptom of a quiet skepticism toward systems that no longer feel responsive or inclusive. Students are still speaking out, but in different ways: through online forums, informal organizations, or personal work. The public square hasn’t disappeared; it has just moved.
Still, the absence of contenders in student elections poses a genuine concern. Without new voices in leadership, critical student concerns risk being left unheard. Without voters, even symbolic mandates lose their weight. Leadership, whether in campus halls or provincial councils, is shaped by those who show up—and reshaped when the young do not.
To label this generation apathetic would be to ignore its complexity. The first step is not to condemn apathy, but to understand it. To ask why promising student leaders are stepping back instead of stepping up. Listen closely to the silence, the absence—not as an end, but as a clue to what needs beginning.
What’s needed isn’t more pressure to participate, but a serious reckoning with why participation feels so hollow. The challenge now is not just encouraging engagement, but rebuilding the meaning of leadership itself, in terms students recognize as real.
The search for accountability to apathy may be a fruitful one. When the ballot goes blank, who holds the responsibility: the students or the system?
