Responding to criticism from students and administrators that the process for this year's Undergraduate Council of Students and Undergraduate Finance Board elections were poorly publicized and rushed, the UCS Election Board issued a revised timeline late Sunday night that pushes key dates back by about a week. But the new schedule violates UCS's Code of Operations by delaying voting until days before reading period commences.
At an emergency meeting last night, the board discussed concerns surrounding the election process and set a new timeline for the election. Most dates are now about a week later than originally planned, so petitions are now due next Monday, and voting will be held on WebCT from Sunday, April 23 to Tuesday, April 25.
Voting concludes three days before reading period commences on April 28, even though the UCS code stipulates that "the election shall take place at least one week before the first day of the reading period, without exception."
"We decided that students seemed to care more about having a seemingly fair electoral process than about following our code," said Kate Brockwehl '08, chair of the Election Board.
UCS President Sarah Saxton-Frump '07 told The Herald, "This is one of those times where we can follow our code and piss off a lot of people ... or we can make a decision to not follow exactly what the code says in the spirit of having a fair election process."
Holding elections so close to reading period isn't ideal, Brockwehl said, but no schedule would be perfect because elections fall during a busy period on campus, with Passover, Easter, Spring Weekend, A Day On College Hill (which now falls on the same night as the candidates' debates), the end of the semester and reading period all presenting possible conflicts.
Brochwehl said she hopes the new timetable and better advertising will encourage outsiders to pursue a UCS position. "A key part of why the elections are being pushed back is to allow students who haven't been on UCS or UFB before to have a few days to come to information session, ask questions about running" and ultimately decide to run, she said.
Even though the code also dictates that the election dates must be set by the end of February each year, the original timeline wasn't formulated until April 4. A campus-wide e-mail announcing the dates was sent out at 3 a.m. April 5.
Informational sessions were held the following day, and candidates were supposed to submit their petitions to run at a meeting to be held tonight - leaving only six days for students to decide whether to run and collect the 100 signatures required for class positions and 400 signatures needed for executive board slots.
Greek Council Chair Meghan Gill '06 sent an e-mail Saturday to other student group leaders asking them to join a Greek Council-led coalition appealing UCS for a revised election process. In the e-mail, Gill wrote that the elections process was unfair because it was poorly advertised - decreasing the chance students not currently in UCS would get involved - and required students to collect signatures in less than a week.
Gill told The Herald she wanted to submit a complaint to UCS to "make it known that student groups on campus aren't happy with the way the elections are being run."
UCS also didn't do a good job telling student group leaders how their groups could endorse candidates, Gill said.
Brockwehl told The Herald that information about endorsements was placed in student group boxes in the Student Activities Office and posted on the SAO Web site. She said she requested that an e-mail be sent to student group leaders, but it's not entirely clear whether an e-mail was sent - Brockwehl said one student group leader indicated receiving the e-mail, but others told her that they didn't get an e-mail. Gill told The Herald she never received an e-mail about endorsements.
Though Gill's e-mail was sent to student group leaders and not UCS members, some students complained to UCS members about the elections process. Others contacted University administrators, who in turn contacted UCS leaders.
The elections process has been plagued since February with a lack of interest in membership on the Election Board. "There is much more involved than initially meets the eye," Brockwehl said.
The board - composed of both UCS members and students who are not a part of UCS - is largely independent of the organization. The UCS president appoints a UCS member as the board's chair, who then appoints the rest of the committee. Election Board members are prohibited from running in the election, creating a shortage of people interested in joining the board.
In mid-February, former UCS Vice President Charlie Cummings '06 agreed to chair the Election Board but later backed out of the role, Saxton-Frump said, leaving her with the task of finding a new chair.
Saxton-Frump said only six UCS members were eligible to head the board because either they weren't returning next year or weren't intending to run in the election. Two of the members - Saxton-Frump herself and Treasurer Jonathan Margolick '06 - would be too busy with other UCS duties to take the job, leaving only four possible candidates to head the board.
"I personally had a very hard time talking anyone into doing it," Saxton-Frump said.
Brockwehl agreed to chair the Election Board in mid-March, and "this has been my number one priority since (then). I've probably spent more time on this than anything else," she said.
"It was a time-consuming process just to get a board together," Brockwehl said. "Students are very eager to complain about the process but not so eager to run for UCS or UFB to try to change it or join things like the Election Board."
Brockwehl wasn't able to fully assemble the board until the week of spring break. The board was not able to meet and set an election timetable until last Tuesday, creating the shorter-than-usual gap between the election's announcement and initial deadlines that in part sparked the criticism that led to the creation of the revised timetable.
Despite the confusion surrounding the election, Brockwehl said she hopes that prospective candidates won't be discouraged. "I would encourage students frustrated by this process and the way it's been carried out to think about all of minutia involved and talk to someone on the Election Board about it instead of rushing to disregard the elections in general and UCS and UFB as organizations," she said.
