On March 30, students elected the 2009-10 Community Senate executives: President Nancy Klosteridis, Vice President Trevor Corning, returning Secretary Hannah Kennedy, and Treasurer Jordan Auleb. With 42 percent voter participation, this election marks a 12 percent increase compared with the 2007 and 2008 elections.
Out of the 567 total ballots cast, 351 supported the winning ticket. Caroline Hemeter, Jada Daniel, Ellie Taylor, and Bryanna Vohs’s received 126 votes. Ten votes were write-ins and 80 were counted as abstentions.
Many of the abstainers participated in an abstention campaign organized by sophomore Zak Wear and members of his disqualified executive ticket. Wear and others passed out fliers on election day calling for a more “horizontal leadership formation,” achieved through eliminating executive positions.
“The idea of an abstention campaign is absolutely legitimate. But the fact that it was backed largely by a group of people who were disqualified is hypocritical,” said current Senate President Joe Pelcher. “I believe a lot of the concerns listed by the people abstaining are being addressed by the by-laws committee and have been addressed in Senate all year.”
Students who chose to vote for a ticket felt abstaining would detract from working towards progress through the current system.
“I didn’t abstain because I had something I wanted to do with my vote,” said first-year Evan Sterling. “I chose to vote for Nancy’s ticket, who I heard from several credible sources had more experience than (Hemeter’s), rather than support a mystery third party that I knew nothing about.”
All of the new executives have experience in leadership roles and attribute their win to their knowledge of the workings of Senate as well as their desire to work with Hemeter’s ticket while running a fair campaign.
“(In terms of campaigning tactics) our current involvement and experience spoke for us,” said Klosteridis. “All of the important proposals in Senate lately have gotten a lot of publicity and caused people to ask us questions about our platform.”
Klosteridis’s ticket spent 12 hours campaigning in front of Founders Hall on election day talking to students about their concerns.
“There were conversations that lasted a few seconds and others that lasted 45 minutes,” said Klosteridis. “We were continually challenged to stand up and justify our beliefs and that was a really cool and worthwhile process.”
In addition to gathering student input, the new executives plan on continuing to revise Senate’s purpose and image.
“We’re hoping the infrastructure changes going through now (in the by-laws committee) will change the way standing committees are set up and will make Senate more of a resource for policy updates and voicing community concerns,” said Kennedy.
According to the current Senate executives, Klosteridis’s ticket represents the culmination of several years of hard work and dedication.
“I feel that Senate has been on a road for change,” said current Vice President Dana Hamdan. “From last year when Vital was president to this year when Joe was president, we talked a lot more about policy and cutting the piggy banking element out of Senate (than in years past) and I think next year’s Senate will finally break even.”
Reflecting on his hopes for Senate’s new leadership, Pelcher said:
“I’m really excited to see this new ticket take advantage of the door we’ve been slowly unlocking for the past two years and watch them finally step through.