The race is over – it’s time to stop and reassess our bearings. The purpose of elections for candidates is to try and earn positions of responsibility. This is not about triumph.

Our new Student Government Association Executive Board needs to consider their success in the elections not as a victory in a race, but as a form of assumed responsibility.

Their responsibilities to the student body need to be their utmost concern – not on the outcome of the campaign, whether bitter or triumphant.

Candidates campaigned on promises, enthusiasm and professionalism. It would be a black mark on the integrity of the senators who ran in the elections if they let this verve and passion disappear.

Do not appear out of your shells to simply win the hearts of the student body only to retreat back to the fringes of our attention.

While we do not expect “campaign fever” year-round, we do want to see more active and out-reaching actions by SGA.

We expect the president and vice presidents to lead SGA with creativity and dynamism, using every available and necessary avenue.

One of these avenues includes collaborating with fellow senators and incorporating ideas that are beneficial for the student body.

Fellow senators include those individuals who did not succeed in the elections and are still in SGA for the duration of this semester.

Each platform had excellent ideas to contribute, and each platform had intelligent people on them who are great assets to SGA.

We need to see these ideas exchanged between these senators before the start of the next academic year.

Work with all of your fellow senators, and work together on a united front to improve SGA.

Politics, elections and campaign races can fracture relations between people. We urge the new executive board and former candidates to collaborate.

SGA will be the stronger for it. The campaign is over. We all of us need to move forward with a vision of reconciliation, productivity and activism.