SGA candidates kick off campaigning

Campaigning for undergraduate student government kicked off this week, and SGA has set its goals for election turnout higher than last year's record numbers, hoping to draw 40 percent of the student body, or 5,000 students. Elections are April 11-13.

SGA has worked to encourage students to vote in order to improve the reputation of Tech's student government among schools locally and nationally.

"We have been publicizing more this year than we have in the past," said Patrick Cook, chair of public relations. "We want to get as many people out there as possible."

According to Cook, last year's voter turnout was close to 38 percent. This year, he said, SGA hopes to top that.

"It's going to be a challenge," Cook said, "but SGA has been very interactive with students this year. The petition against a midyear tuition increase is just one example of how we've been working well with students."

SGA plans to raise voter turnout among the student population, continued Cook, by comparing Tech to other schools locally and nationally.

"We want to emphasize the competition between schools to get high voter turnout," he said. "Last year Duke had the highest turnout-around 44 percent-and we want be the best this year."

Chris Rankine, chair of the Elections Committee, agreed. "It's going to be hard to beat last year's turnout," he said, "but we should be able to bring in more people if we treat it as a competition."

This year's candidates for the position of undergraduate student body president include: David Andersen, Andrew Howard, Tony Le, Micah S. Lucas and Will Welch. Each has different reasons for running.

"I am running for SGA president because I have a genuine desire to assist in bettering the Tech community," Welch said.

Howard said, "After serving as the RHA President for the last two years, I feel that I still had a lot left to give and a lot of good ideas to work with to make Tech a better place for everyone."

"I am running for SGA president because I have a true love for Georgia Tech, and I see this as my way of giving back to a school which has given me so much," Andersen said.

The other presidential candidates were not able to be reached for comment.

Saria Amir, Paul Byrne and Victor Jaworski are running for the position of executive vice president.

The elections committee has made several changes in the elections code to regulate campaigning, which began this Monday and will continue for two weeks until April 11, after which students will be able to vote.

"Most changes to SGA policies in elections are made as a result of problems during the previous years," Rankine said.

He said that SGA's greatest worry for the current election is the possibility of having an election in which candidates do not adhere to SGA policy in campaigning.

"I have seen elections where people tread the line," he said. "Our goal is to have rules and keep everyone calm."

For this reason, the elections committee meets to set out the rules and regulations in an elections code prior to campaigning. This document is then passed by the Undergraduate House of Representatives and established as the guideline to be used by candidates.

Three major changes were made in this year's passed version of the elections code. The candidates are now allowed, for example, to have one four-by-eight sign and one three-by-six sign among their posters placed around campus. This is different from last year's restriction of two three-by-six signs.

"By allowing the candidates to use bigger signs, we are allowing them to be more flexible and creative in their campaigning efforts," Rankine said. In addition, the committee reworded the content of the Penalties and Violations section of the document because "some of the language in the section was unclear," according to Rankine. Finally, he said, the committee added a section with "provisions to prevent mass emailing by candidates."