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The Student News Site of Saint Louis University

The University News

The Student News Site of Saint Louis University

The University News

SGA task force to review election

Last years SGA election winners, the Limitless ticket.
Last years SGA election winners, the Limitless ticket.

The Saint Louis University Student Government Association elections are just around the corner, and preparations are already being made for the upcoming campaigns and election season.

Last years SGA election winners, the Limitless ticket.
Last years SGA election winners, the Limitless ticket.

The process for this year is not undergoing any significant changes, but while candidates are petitioning the student body for votes, the new SGA Election Task Force will also be at work to look for ways the elections can be made more effective.

“The task force stemmed out of conversations we had near the end of the last semester regarding changes to the election,” Vice President of Diversity and Social Justice and Chair of the Election Task Force Sean Worley said. “President [Blake] Exline saw that there was an interest in changing the election process, and he put forth the legislation to create the task force.”

There was significant debate in SGA last semester in regards to the possibility of eliminating the tickets from the election process, as well as several other factors that affect the way the elections are run. According to Worley, in the interest of making informed and well thought out decisions, the association voted to create the task force to collect more information on the matter.

The task force will be comprised of two or three current senators and committee representatives. The association is also looking to recruit a student who has voted in past elections as well as a student who has not voted in the past to get some different perspectives on how the election.

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There are also spots reserved for representatives from each election ticket so that the perspectives of current candidates will be represented.

According to the election commissioner, senior Chris Ackels, the task force will provide a chance to create some change in the election process and fix problems with the current system.

“The Election Task Force will watch and evaluate the election and come up with ways to change the process,” Ackels said. “It is a chance to analyze it from a third-party perspective.”

Worley and Ackels also intend to work together to collect data on what encourages candidates to run or not to run for a SGA position.

In addition, the task force will be collecting data on what sort of SLU student demographics vote in the elections.

“We will end up looking at why students vote in the election, why students do not vote and where students are voting from in terms of if we are reaching out to certain colleges or years more than others,” Worley said. “This will all be collected via the demographics that are already collected from a student when they vote since the voting is done through Banner.”

The election season kicks off with information sessions at the end of January to provide the necessary information to potential candidates.

Election packets for all candidates are due by Feb. 1 and the tickets and other senatorial candidates will be officially announced on Feb. 3.

Once their candidacy is confirmed, candidates can begin to campaign publicly on campus.

While nothing is confirmed yet, Ackels believes that this year’s election will be an interesting one.

“We will have a contest this year,” Ackels said. “There will be at least two tickets in the race.”

Election day will be on Feb. 26, with the polls opening at 6 a.m.

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