Sophomore Stanley Abraham and Junior Mario Saade prevailed in an election yesterday to fill the two recently vacated seats on the Tufts Community Union (TCU) Senate.
"I'm excited to work with Mario and Stanley," TCU President Neil DiBiase said. "I think they should be honored that they were selected by their [peers] to represent them."
The 24-hour contest was marked by the moderate-to-low voter turnout that has come to be expected from special elections. Twenty-five percent of juniors submitted their online votes, as compared to 35 percent of sophomores.
Elections Commission (ECOM) Public Relations Chair Anjali Nirmalan, a junior, said that the sophomores probably had better participation because they had more candidates to choose from and because a large number of juniors are abroad.
While four students ran to fill the seat vacated by sophomore Callie Kolbe, only two threw their hats in for the junior seat that opened up after Constantin Sabet D'Acre left the Senate.
Still, Nirmalan said that the turnout could have been worse.
"It is definitely better than previous years; we've gotten 10 percent before for special elections," she said.
Both candidates will take their seats on the Senate with expansive platforms, and although their ideas may be idealistic, DiBiase said that their enthusiasm will be welcomed.
"It reminds us why we're doing what we're doing," he said.
Specifically, Abraham, who defeated classmates Emily Gianetta, Alexandra Roy and D.C. Wolf, ran on a platform of making the Senate more transparent to the Tufts community.
Last night he said he intends to fulfill his promises.
"I plan on trying to increase the connection between the student body and the Senate," he said. "I'm going to try to open channels of communication."
While he waged an unsuccessful Senate campaign last year, he saw a second chance in Kolbe's resignation.
"When I saw that a seat had opened up, I decided to jump on the opportunity," he said.
Meanwhile, Saade had never run, but said that he had previously considered being a candidate and after "some messy issues surfaced" this year, he decided that it was the appropriate time.
"I had resisted ... the temptation [to run] before, but now I just couldn't handle it," he said.
His main priorities are improving the social scene, increasing academic options, diversifying the meal plan and bolstering security on- and near-campus.
With regards to the social scene, he feels that the recent decision to enforce already-existing BYOB policies at Greek houses may be too much.
"I think we have to compromise a little more on that," he said.
Saade also said that he enjoyed the race against classmate Eyal Amit.
"It wasn't a messy election; it was quite smooth," he said. "My opponent [is] a great guy."
Voting yesterday went off without a hitch, according to Nirmalan. The peak time was between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m.; over half the ballots were cast during that period.
She said that an early-morning e-mail reminding students to participate probably "motivated many of the votes."
With the election now over, the Senate will be fully staffed again for the first time since Kolbe stepped down on Sept. 23. Sabet D'Acre followed suit on Oct. 2.
"It's unfortunate that we lost members in the first place, but ... we're really just happy that we'll get to be a fully-functioning Senate once again," TCU Historian Alex Pryor said.
