On Monday, the Student Government Association (SGA) announced its new executive board for the 2012-2013 academic year. After three days, student voters elected junior Moses Song, sophomore Alex Schupper, sophomore Michael St. Germain and sophomore Paige Doyle to serve on SGA’s executive board. The election set a record for one of the highest voter turnouts in school history, a 40.5 percent participation rate.
In the SGA Executive Elections this year, 2026 students voted, increasing the voting turnout percentage to 40.5 percent from approximately 34 percent last year.
“It’s amazing. In terms of involvement in SGA elections, in SGA in general, it is such a stark change between my freshman year and now. I felt like my freshman year, people knew the SGA, had an idea of what we did. But now, especially because of the turnout, people are actually invested in the social changes that we can accomplish, the fact that we have so many great candidates and the fact that these elections are really something that people want to get involved in. So I think the highest percent turnout ever really speaks to all of that,” senior Ardi Mendoza, current SGA Executive President, said.
SGA attributes this historically-high voter participation to a number of things. Song gives credit to an enthusiastic and active freshman class.
“The freshman class this year is very active,” Song said. “Last semester, when we had the O-show, I went in and saw the entire Shriver Hall packed, and that’s never happened the years before that. So I think the freshman class this year are very active and they have a voice definitely on campus and they wanted to make it heard. So I think that’s why they participated in this voting.”
The campaigning of the two tickets may have also been a contributing factor to the increase in voter turnout.
“We were pretty relentless with our campaign, to be honest. Probably to the point of nausea... that constant heckling of people, even though at the time it seemed annoying and troublesome, it got their vote and it got their voice out,” Schupper said.
Song, a junior, won 926 votes, 45.71 percent of the votes, to serve as SGA Executive President next year. His opponent, junior Wyatt Larkin, had 845 votes, or 41.71 percent of the total.
“I was exhilarated yesterday, definitely, when the results came out,” Song said, when recalling how he reacted to the results. “I was dumbfounded for, like, two seconds. I didn’t know what was going on until I called my parents and they celebrated for me, at five in the morning, Korea time.”
Both presidential candidates had prior SGA experience, and the results demonstrate that the election was a close call.
“For me, the toughest battle was easily the Presidency position,” Mendoza said. “And you’ll see through the numbers that they are very close between Wyatt and Moses... [Larkin’s] been instrumental in a lot of the initiatives that we have accomplished with the Executive Board and the Student Government.”
Nevertheless, Mendoza is optimistic about Song’s position on the SGA Executive Board.
“In general he’s really big on increasing student involvement in either SGA activities or just school wide activities in general. He’ll be a great person to lead the Student Government and the student body,” he said.
Since the election, Song has already planning for his term. He has been talking to Susan Boswell and pushing to include more community service in freshman orientation. In the elections for Vice President, sophomore Schupper took the most votes, with 958 or 47.29 percent of the votes. His opponent, junior Joanna Gawlik garnered 847 votes, 41.81 percent of the votes towards the Vice Presidential elections.
“I think it just shows our dedication toward the Student Government and the student body as a whole,” Schupper said, considering his victory in conjunction with those of Song and Doyle’s. “I think with three-quarters of our ticket getting elected, it really shows that our persistence throughout this week of campaigning and getting our voice out to the students, letting them know our platform and what we stand for, and I feel like people were really receptive to that. I feel like that really led to the student body believing in us and wanting us to represent them.”
The election for treasurer was one of the closest compared to the races for the other three positions. Sophomore Michael St. Germain emerged victorious with 823 votes, 40.62 percent of the votes. Opponents Anna Huang, a junior, and Maxwell Dickey, a freshman, received 792 votes or 39.09 percent and 142 votes or 7.01 percent of the votes, respectively. St. Germain is also the only winning candidate from the Larkin, Gawlik, St. Germain and Schwitzer ticket.
“Obviously, I’m upset,” St. Germain said, regarding the other members of his ticket not winning. “I think that it would’ve been great to work with the people I ran with... I thought I worked best with them. But that being said, we’re all adults and we’re all good people and I think that ultimately, we’ll be able to be an effective Executive Board next week.”
Schupper noted that the majority of his ticket winning was a great accomplishment he felt proud of. With immense respect for his opponents, he felt that the election was a tough race.
“I was happy three of us won, if any. Taking down three incumbents this past year is not an easy thing to do. Especially since the exec board has so much name recognition throughout the year,” Schupper said.
St. Germain was a top contender for the executive board this year, as the other competitors for treasurer had no prior experience on the SGA and has already made strides for increased sustainability on campus. Schupper spoke on behalf of the rest of his original ticket about St. Germain.
“We are so glad to have Michael St. Germain on our ticket. He’s a good friend of ours and he’s going to do some great things next year,” Schupper said.
In the secretary elections, Doyle, a sophomore, took 50.54 percent of the votes for secretary with 929 votes while Debra Schwitzer, also a sophomore, received 828 votes or 45.05 percent of the votes. Next year will be Doyle’s first year involved in SGA.
“I’m really excited to get involved and get to know all of the different people who are on it as well as being able to get my ideas heard. For me, it’s more of a way to figure out what it’s all about. I’m coming as less SGA-experienced than the rest of my ticket,” Doyle said.
The SGA is also eager to see what Doyle will do as a leader of the student body.
“It will be really exciting to see what she has to accomplish next year being elected as secretary,” Mendoza said.
