Freshmen Oren Bakspun and Jessie Lawrence, who ran for freshman class president and vice-president respectively, won with 82 votes in the general freshmen elections on Tuesday, November 20.
Their opponents, freshmen Taylor DeGiovanni and Elana Shapiro, received 26 votes.
The late freshmen caucus election occured after all but one of five tickets were disqualified in the original primary elections on Thursday, October 18 due to internet campaigning violations. A primary revote was held Thursday, November 15.
The sophomore election continued as scheduled on Wednesday, October 24. Sophomores Valeriya Tsitron and Casey Griffin, last year’s freshman president and vice president respectively, won.
Last year, 161 people—17 percent of the freshman class—voted in the freshman general election.
DeGiovanni and Shapiro were the sole ticket that was not disqualified in the October primary. They automatically advanced to the general elections with 25 votes. Only that ticket and the winners of the November 15 primary, Bakspun and Lawrence, competed in the general election.
The November 15 primary election included 10 tickets.
“It is great that so many people wanted to run, especially after the previous election,” said senior and Board of Elections (BOE) co-chair Joyce Greenbaum.
According to the BOE, 250 students voted in the November primary, in which each voter could cast two votes. “That’s a good turnout. People were definitely interested in this election because of the violations of the first one,” Greenbaum said.
Bakspun and Lawrence won the November primary with 32 votes.
Bakspun said, “Considering the outcome of the first [October] primaries, the rules were very important in our campaigning and were the first things that we told our campaigners and also reminded them a second time before the general elections.”
“I did not want to run in the [first elections] because it was in the beginning of the year and I did not want to stress myself out. When I heard about the re-elections, I got used to school and decided to run,” Lawrence said. “That is why so many people ran this time.”
The president and vice-president said their primary goal is to fairly represent the freshman class. “As freshmen president I plan to […] cater to the needs of the grade and represent the grade as a whole,” Bakspun said. “Also, Jessie and I feel that building awareness for the environment and helping those in need is very important and we will try to help people utilize different resources that they have available to help.”
“Some freshmen think their opinions don’t matter because they’re new, but we hope to show that that is not the case,” Lawrence said.