University of Idaho students took to the polls Monday to decide on seven ASUI Senate seats.
Elections opened Monday and will stay open until 5 p.m. Wednesday. Students will receive one email with a link to the ballot each day they do not vote during the 3-day voting period.
ASUI President Max Cowan said voting for student government is one of the simplest ways to get involved in your school.
And this year, he said the voting process for ASUI has become even simpler.
This year”s election ballot only lists ASUI Senate candidates, instead of including other polling questions on policy issues and spending as in years past.
“Fewer pages means students are more likely to finish the ballot,” Cowan said.
Cowan said senators had no important questions left unanswered. He said ASUI had already received feedback about tobacco policy and Finals Fest, as well as answered other questions through a series of single-question polls via email.
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Senate Parliamentarian Tanner Beymer (left) attends an ASUI senate meeting Nov. 11 in the Idaho Commons.
“With the polls on things like medical amnesty and marking transcripts, we are engaging students consistently throughout the year,” Cowan said, mentioning he hopes this will increase voter turnout at elections and increase engagement throughout the year.
Austin Karstetter, ASUI Communications Board chair, said nearly 700 students voted last fall. This fall, nearly 400 votes were cast in the first few hours of voting Monday. Karstetter has been running this semester”s senate elections with Election Coordinator Bailey Brown.
In the past, Cowan said they have received some negative feedback from students who did not expect to answer polling questions and thought the questions were misleading.
“This is a more efficient process that I think the average student appreciates,” Cowan said.
Karstetter said using emails to promote ASUI elections began last year and has likely been the cause of increases in voter turnout.
In past years, students have had to log on to VandalWeb and fill out a form before voting.
“The email brings the ballot right to the student,” Cowan said.
Karstetter said the email means ASUI no longer needs to promote elections, which saves a considerable amount of time. Now, he said every undergraduate student gets an email informing them they can vote in the election.
This election is different in other ways as well.
Karstetter said that because of a communication error, three candidates did not send their photos and bios to ASUI, so the ballot was sent out without them.
ASUI sent the ballot email at 8 a.m. Monday, and by the time the correction was made at 11:22 a.m., 303 students had already voted and 84 were logged on and may or may not have seen the updates, Karstetter said.
Karstetter said he and Cowan talked to the three candidates, and so far none of them have said they plan to contest the results.
Cowan said they plan to move forward with the election, including the first 300 votes as normal.
He said they looked at the results and found no correlation between presence of photo and bio and votes received and that these first votes are likely from some of the most informed students.
“We are willing to say that these people who voted within the first hour of voting have been paying enough attention that the photos and bios wouldn”t matter,” Cowan said.
In the event one of the affected candidates decides to contest the results, Karstetter said they can do so any time before the results are announced and for a short while afterward.
Cowan said he is not sure exactly how yet, but that he has already talked to ITS and thinks there is a process they could go through to throw out the first votes.
Karstetter said this could result in the first votes being thrown out or sent back to be filled out again, or the entire election could need to be redone.
“There are more candidates than we typically see,” Karstetter said. “It has usually been hard to find such a large and diverse group of candidates.”
Karstetter said off-campus students are usually under-represented and there are generally more Greek students than non-Greek.
There are 16 candidates on the ballot this year – double the number from last fall – and Karstetter said there is a good mix of students from each type of living group, including off-campus students. Since only seven senators are elected each fall, and eight in the spring, Karstetter said there was competition in the election last fall. He said competition is important to ensure quality representation.
Students used to seeing candidates with tables in the Idaho Commons may notice that they are absent this year. Karstetter said this is because the number of people in the commons at any given time varies greatly throughout the day, and it was impossible to make scheduling fair.
Karstetter said efforts to increase turnout and competition for senate elections are critical. He said ASUI, and specifically the senate, does a lot for student experience
“This is important,” said ASUI Lobbyist Nate Fisher. “Senators are a student”s most direct link to ASUI and ASUI is a student”s voice with the administration.”
While Fisher said ASUI is not always visible, it does have an impact on the student experience at UI.
Nishant Mohan can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @NishantRMohan