After an elections cycle that went off with only one glitch, 19 students were elected to on-campus leadership positions.
Students were able to start voting for Tufts Community Union (TCU) senators, Committee on Student Life (CSL) representatives and TCU Judiciary members sat 12 a.m. on Wednesday morning and had until 11:59 p.m. that evening to cast their ballots.
The election for sophomore senators was delayed, however, and the correct ballot did not make it online until around 2 a.m. The results of all of the elections were released to the Daily at around 12:40 this morning.
In the (TCU) Senate election, the only contested election was for rising sophomores. In that race, 18 students battled for only seven seats. The winners are Callie Kolbe, Lizzie Komar, Xavier Malina, CJ Mourning, Duncan Pickard, Brandon Rattiner and Scott Silverman. All of them except for Komar and Rattiner are incumbents.
Of the 11 candidates for the TCU Judiciary, the seven winners are freshman Oriane Dusserre, junior Justin Greenbaum, sophomore Jeff Kiok, sophomore Briane Knight, freshman David Mok, sophomore Veda Shastri and junior Allison Towle. Kiok and Shastri are the only returning members.
Eleven students also ran for the (CSL), but only five seats were available. The winners are Clara Chan, Ben Filippo, JohnPaul Makilya, Emeka Nwabuzor and Sarah Ullman. All of them are freshmen.
According to sophomore Adam Welai, the chair of the TCU's Elections Commission (ECOM), the makeup of the new CSL is not surprising.
"Since the Class of 2010 really poured out to the polls for their [senators] ... they were able to support their fellow class members running for CSL and [the Judiciary] as well," he said.
In fact, freshman participation in the elections far outstripped turnout from the other classes.
While 68 percent of current freshmen voted for their senators for next year, participation in the CSL and Judiciary elections was 37 percent. Both elections had the same turnout because they are on the same ballot.
Weldai said the turnout in all three elections, especially the Senate one, was remarkable. He said that the goal for the Senate election was 50 percent participation, and that the actual turnout of 68 percent was "absolutely amazing." Although the 37 percent turnout in the other two elections was about standard, he said that it was impressive because rising junior and senior Senate candidates faced unopposed elections, which is unusual.
Since current sophomores and juniors did not have to vote for senators, he said that their participation in the other two contests demonstrated a commitment to on-campus elections.
He attributed the favorable turnout to some of the efforts that ECOM made this year. For the first time at least in recent years, students were able to vote not only online, but also at a mobile polling station set up in the Mayer Campus Center.
Also, the voting period was extended. Traditionally, elections have started at 9 a.m. and lasted until 11:59 p.m. He said that the midnight start helped attract several voters. Specifically, many students voted between midnight and 2 a.m.
"We know that there was a big push for the CSL, because in those two hours eleven percent of the total [37] percent voted," he said.
Although elections ran smoothly for the most part, there was one glitch that members of ECOM discovered about two hours before the ballots went live.
On the ballot for sophomore senators, current sophomores instead of freshmen were cleared to vote.
ECOM members then had to delete the names that were entered and create a new list. It was an involved process that took around four hours, Weldai said.
According to sophomore and ECOM technician Nicholas Horelik, several candidates e-mailed members of ECOM within the 10 minutes after midnight because they discovered that the ballots were not active online.
But despite initial concern, he said that nobody appeared overly upset about the glitch. "Afterwards, it seemed [that] no one had a problem with it," he said.
During the time when the ballots were not online, Weldai said that the candidates were "kept in the loop [and] did a good job of notifying their constituencies."
Although three elections took place yesterday, two were decided well before the recent voting because the Senate elections for rising juniors and seniors were uncontested.
The new senior senators are Amanda Richardson, Bruni Hirsch, Daniel Katzman, Alexandra Pryor, Evan Dreifuss and Deborah Block. Block, Dreifuss and Richardson are incumbents.
Constantin Sabet D'Acre, Elton Skyes, Matt Shapanka, Jennifer Bailey, Emerson Luke, Neil DiBiase and Isabel Duke are the new junior senators. Skyes, Shapanka and DiBiase are returning senators while the rest are new.
The next campus-wide election that ECOM will sponsor will be for the TCU Senate president. Official nominations will take place next week. According to Weldai, it currently appears that it will be will largely a two-person race.
-Christy McCuaig contributed reporting to this article.
