The Student Government announced the fall election results on Wednesday night, including the contested positions of Class Council for the Class of 2014, senators for each AU school and senators at-large.
The turnout for this election was small, with only 1,021 votes compared to the average 1,200 voters, according to Board of Elections Chair Anthony Dunham.
“We didn’t fall too far from the average, but [it is] a considerable amount,” Dunham said. “The Board of Elections will be working on a better campaign strategy for voters for the spring.”
One of these strategies will be to make computers available and accessible to voters on campus locations, such as the main quad.
Class of 2014 President-elect Malea Otranto said she vigorously campaigned to the freshmen of Letts Hall in order to win.
“I definitely strategized because I knew I had to get 22 percent of the vote in order to win,” Otranto said. “So I stuck to Letts and made that my core base since most of the freshmen are here.”
Otranto ran with Vice President-elect Megan Huber and Secretary-elect Raakkel Sims, both of whom also won their respective seats.
Otranto’s agenda includes raising school spirit, sanctioning freshmen activities and creating a committee system for students to appeal to the Class Council.
But Huber said the 2014 Class Council first needs to become better acquainted before they pursue these goals.
“We all need to get to know each other as a team and figure out what the class wants us to do together as a whole,” Huber said.
Class of 2014 senator-elect Emily Yu said the election went well for her because she spent time explaining her issues to voters in person.
“I think a lot of it came down to name recognition and who went around talking to people to give them the word,” Yu said.
While the Senate’s first priority is to get permission for the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps to practice on campus, Yu said another big project she wants to pursue for the year would be consolidating the tutoring programs of all the AU clubs.
“[I would] keep them as individual clubs but put them under a bigger branch, just so it would be easier for students to find out when and where they can tutor,“ Yu said.
Although the year has just begun, members of the Student Government have high hopes for their new electors.
“I’m very optimistic about what they’re going to do,” Dunham said. “I’m always believing in the power of students to change where they are to where they want to be.”
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The following is a full list of the election results:
Class of 2014 President: Malea Otranto Class of 2014 Vice President: Megan Huber Class of 2014 Treasurer: Cody Ragonese Class of 2014 Secretary: Raakkel Sims Senate At-Large: David Bawel, Joseph Chmielewski, Joe Wisniewski, Zack Cady 2014 Senate: John Caddock, Abby Finn, Franky Irwin, Ezekiel Jalloh, Emily Yu 2013 Senate: Brett Atanasio, Bikram Kohli, Eric Reath, Taylor Yeates, Tim McBride 2012 Senate: Danielle Raso, Liz Richards (write-ins to be reviewed) 2011 Senate: (write-ins to be reviewed) CAS Senate: Amy Leazes (write-ins to be reviewed) Kogod Senate: Alexander Robinson SIS Senate: Hadid Simmons SPA Senate: Deon (DJ) Jones SOC Senate: (write-ins to be reviewed)
