The Associated Students of Boise State University (ASBSU) held elections from March 22 to March 23 for fee-paying students to choose the 2021 elected positions.
For spring 2021, ASBSU student government elections received 1,102 votes, which is 7% of eligible voters, according to an email sent by the 2021 ASBSU Elections Committee. Compared to spring 2020 student government elections, which received 885 votes, or 5.9%, of eligible voters.
Photo courtesy Maiya Shoemaker | The Arbiter
The winners for the positions are:
President and Vice President – Kenneth Huston and Sarah Smith (51.2%)
Vice President of Inclusive Excellence – Grace Burgert (71.8%)
Vice President of Academic Affairs – Graf Kirk (70.4%)
Vice President of Student Organizational Affairs – Kayla Magana (92%)
Huston and Smith received 512 votes, and are both a part of ASBSU’s executive team currently. They are focused on transparency within ASBSU, students’ mental health and food insecurity. Huston and Smith hope to work with the university to hire more mental health counselors and to achieve their other goals.
Burgert received 676 votes and has been a part of the Inclusive Excellence Student Council (IESC) prior to being elected. She will work towards expanding efforts to help marginalized and underrepresented communities on campus and getting organizations on campus involved with the IESC.
Kirk received 660 votes and currently serves as the vice president of Academic Affairs for ASBSU. Graf wants to continue the work he has been doing, such as leading senate meetings each week, lobbying for ASBSU at the Capitol building and organizing the Golden Apple Awards for Boise State.
Kayla Magana ran unopposed and received 867 votes. Magana is currently serving as the interim president of ASBSU and previously was the vice president of Student Organizational Affairs. Magana will continue where she left off and reach out to organizations and clubs to make them feel comfortable with the fund-request process.
Due to ASBSU using a ranked-choice voting system, meaning voters ranked their candidate choices from first to fourth, counting is done in a three-round ranked system for the positions of President and Vice President, according to the ASBSU election results website.
The first round of votes were tallied for each ticket. The candidates in last place then got their votes distributed between the remaining two tickets, and so on until the third round. According to the ASBSU website, 1,000 votes were cast for the president and vice president positions, and 102 abstained from voting on this position. The end result had Huston and Smith’s ticket winning with 51.2% of the vote.
These results have been verified by advisors and an independent professor in the School of Public Service, according to the ASBSU website.
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