Student Union secretary position remains available after second round of elections
On Feb. 12, Brandeis students voted in the second round of elections this semester to fill three open Student Union positions: Secretary, Rosenthal Quad senator and Ziv Quad senator.
The first round of elections was held on Jan. 29 and filled the positions of vice president and midyear senator. The position of secretary was opened up when former Student Union Secretary Charlotte Franco ’15 won the position of vice president in this round.
The positions of Ziv Quad senator and Rosenthal Quad senator were not filled in the last election round because of voter abstention in the Ziv Quad election and a ballot error in the Rosenthal Quad senator election.
According to Student Union President Sneha Walia ’15, the Rosenthal Quad senator ballot unintentionally did not list one of the candidates, so a second round of voting was necessary.
Three students ran for the position of secretary, but the “abstain” option won. Abstain won with 121 votes total, which was 34 percent of the total votes cast.
Kris Labovitch ’17, who received 57 percent of the votes cast, was elected to the position of Rosenthal Quad senator.
“I ran because I consider myself lucky to be in Rosie Quad, I love the people in it and I hope to make the rest of the semester as successful as possible,” wrote Labovitch in an email to the Justice. His goals include installing more washers and dryers in Rosenthal Quad, introducing new sustainability initiatives and increasing budget transparency.
Ellen Parker ’16 was elected to the position of Ziv Quad senator.
Parker was the only candidate running for the position, and won with 70 percent of the vote.
Parker did not respond to a request for comment by press time.
According to Franco, elections for next year’s Student Union will be held in the upcoming weeks.
The first round of elections for the upcoming academic year will take place Thursday, March 12.
In the upcoming first round, students will be voting on the election of many positions, including president, vice president, secretary, treasurer and positions on several different boards.
The second round of elections will take place on Tuesday, March 24, according to Franco.
In this round, students will vote on all of the senator positions. This includes two senators-at-large, eight class senators (two per class) and one senator for racial minority students.
Additionally, students will vote on five associate justices of the Student Judiciary.
Elections will be held online for 24 hours on these dates. All candidates must attend mandatory elections meetings in order to be entered on the ballot.
All new Union members will start a formal training process when elected and will be officially sworn into their positions at the end of the spring semester.
Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Justice.