1. Building Diversity in
Student Elections
Elimination of the Slate system and other measures taken by the
SGA Supreme Court
2. Low Turnout & Low Diversity
• Numbers of students voting in past
elections are low.
This affects how funds are dictated and
the legitimacy of SGA.
• There is low diversity amongst the
candidates that are running for SGA
offices.
There same groups are voting and the
same groups are running. So the same
groups are receiving advocacy.
• Together, these two factors have
contributed to the isolation of SGA
from the entirety of its student body.
3. Root Cause Analysis
• Why have these problems occurred in the first place?
• First, we have the Slate system:
Students arrange themselves on multi-seat campaigns. Members of a Slate
share a platform and are advertised/campaign as one. EX: CardVision,
21Lou, CardsUnite
Identification is by slate, not by self.
Power matching occurs.
• Roughly three groups dominate candidate profiles:
Greek affiliated students
High profile scholars
Task Force Freshman and LEAD alumni
4. Demographic of
Candidates
• Greek affiliated students
• Huge voter base with large
social network
• Programming/funding interests
• Likely to be highly involved
• High profile scholars
• Not as large as Greeks, but still
maintain a large voter base
with a large social network.
• Likely to be highly involved.
• TFF and LEAD alumni
• “Feeder” programs
• Very exclusive
• Prepares students to participate
in SGA
5. SGA General Election Rules (SGAGER) 2016
As approved by the Student Senate October 20th, 2015
6. Dissolution of the Growth Machine
• Banning Slates…
Made students responsible for earning their own votes
Promoted individual evaluation
Opened the elections
• We also chose to lower the amount of money students could spend on
their campaign:
$500 limit for the Office of Student Body President
$500 limit for the Offices of Student Body VPs
$200 limit for the Offices of College President
$200 limit for the Offices of College VP
$150 limit for the Offices of Student Senators
7. 2016 Election Results
• 1,503 student voters participated
in the election.
• The Campaign Value Reports
reflected that students spent less
money.
• Candidates from organizations
that have not previously
participated in SGA.
• The Court received significantly
less complaints.
“Logistically, slates did not affect the
voting process, so barring the
formation of slates did not detract
from the voting experience. In totality,
banning slates made the election
process more democratic and
empirically, less contentious, as
evidenced by the remarkably fewer
complaints filed.” from Pratik Bhade,
Associate Justice for the College of
Business
8. Projecting for 2017
• We still want higher voter turnout and more diversity amongst the
candidates running for office.
• Our current ideas include:
Find ways to bring resources to the candidates.
Reach into our student by way of –
Scheduling more interest meetings with RSOs and different colleges.
Instead of a debate, creating a town hall “circuit.”
Make the colleges responsible for hosting a debate for candidates running for
college-specific positions.
• We are trying to coordinate with other institutions: Boston
University, the University of Florida, some Canadian/English
institutions
