On Friday, the 5 p.m. deadline to submit petitions to run for the Associated Student Government Executive Board came and went. Three pairs, consisting of Luke Adams and Devon Pratt, Michael McGee and Thomas Smithburg, and Bill Pulte and Patrick Dawson, submitted petitions to run for president and vice president, respectively. This is the first year the two executive board positions will run on the same ticket.
Matt Bellassai, a Weinberg freshman, is currently running unopposed for student life director, and Muhammad Safdari, a Weinberg junior, was the only candidate to gather the signatures to run for academic director.
The field is small compared to last year’s five presidential candidates, two candidates for academic vice president and two for student services vice president. Only Vikram Karandikar ran for executive vice president, a position that is now elected by the ASG senate and is called “student groups director.”
The number of candidates was not reflective of less outreach on the part of ASG, said Paul David Shrader, ASG’s elections commissioner. He said he had sent the same number of solicitations to e-mail listservs as previous elections commissioners.
The Weinberg senior added that decisions to run were usually made regardless of any ASG-led public relations campaign.
“Generally, students who want to run know that they want to run, and they are seeking out information,” Shrader said.
He speculated that other factors might have dissuaded students from running.
“Maybe people don’t think that there is a need for outsiders in ASG,” he said. “It could just be general apathy as well. Obviously, I like to think that it’s the first.”
Adams, a presidential candidate who ran last year, said he is running again to bring attention to students’ ambivalence about ASG elections.
“I see ASG campaigns as there’s one select group of people who participate, both running for positions and voting,” the Weinberg junior said. “There are a lot of students that just don’t care.”
Adams, who has no prior experience in ASG, is running on a platform to cut what he views as “superfluous spending.” He said his campaign strategy will involve using unique methods, such as bringing marching band members into the dining halls to campaign, in order to bring new voters into the race.
“I want to get as many people involved in the campaign as possible,” he said. “If I do win, everybody feels like they had a hand.”
Other students asked about the process said they did not know most, if not all, of the candidates running.
Weinberg sophomore Rozmin Ajanee said she only recognized McGee’s name from his campaign’s sidewalk chalk ads drawn during his run for ASG vice president last year. She said the student life and academic director races were unopposed due to the positions’ lack of prestige.
“Maybe people want a more coveted position because the minor roles don’t look as good,” Ajanee said.
Brittany McPherson, who also only recognized McGee’s name, said she believed NU’s relative dearth of election enthusiasm stemmed from the abundance of other opportunities to lead student groups.
“A lot of the people who could do these jobs are already presidents of other student groups,” the Communication junior said.
Students can still submit petitions to run for any of the positions, Shrader said. Interested students would need to submit 200 petition signatures to Shrader. The late submission of the petition would count only as one of three elections guidelines violations required for the elections committee to suspend a campaign.
“It’s definitely doable,” Shrader said.
