Student Council Conducts Elections

By  Moksha Akil, Krish Patel, Clark Wu and Hansi Zhu

Due to a schoolwide ban on club operations last spring, Student Council (StuCo) was unable to hold elections and appointments for committee heads, class representatives and other offices, according to club adviser Laura Marshall. As a result, all elections and appointments were delayed into the fall term of this year.

This delay in elections created a loss of voting power for the majority in StuCo. Whereas a usual voting session may include 90 to a 100 members, in the past six months, every StuCo decision was made by only five.

StuCo Co-Secretary senior Phil Horrigan found the drastic decline in voices at the table a significant detriment to both performance and productivity. 

“Our performance in the spring without those representatives and committee heads was dismal, and we got much less done than we had all hoped we would,” he said.

 However, Co-President senior Charlotte Lisa remained optimistic and chose to only loosely outline plans in the spring to prevent any “lasting executive decisions.” 

“We will ask committee heads and representatives how they think we could best adapt to COVID health regulations once they are in position and possibly reform our current plan,” she said.

Co-Secretary upper Siona Jain spoke on the disadvantages to delaying elections until this fall. “I wish we could have brought more students into the conversation because, at the end of the day, it was just us five, and that’s not exactly the most transparent for Student Council, which is supposed to be for students,” she said. “I think that’s one thing that was definitely a setback: not having committees, other people and other council members, and [not being able] to constantly update everybody.”

The student government at Phillips Academy Andover did not encounter these problems. Andover held its elections and operated almost completely virtually, using spring term as a period for administrative transition. 

To Horrigan, circumstances around the pandemic revealed a pressing issue surrounding the practicality of the StuCo Constitution. Many current StuCo policies, including the order and operation of elections, the appointment of committee heads, the composition of the Exec Board and aspects of the weekly meeting, violate what is outlined in the document. He pointed out a clause under Section E, point three of the Constitution, which mandates appointment of new committee heads “within two weeks after [the presidential] election.” 

Horrigan found StuCo’s response—passing House Rules that superseded the Constitution—to be “sketchy, to say the least.”

“According to our advisers, if we are acting ‘in the spirit of Student Council’ to the best of our ability, then we are not limited by the document,” Horrigan added. “I find this ridiculous because I ran on a platform of repealing the Constitution [because I thought] that it mattered.”

However, Jain expressed satisfaction with the Executive Board’s abidance to the Constitution. “I think we’ve done the best we could’ve under the circumstances of COVID,” Jain said. “For example, constitutionally, elections have to happen before committee head assignments should happen, I think it’s something like a few weeks before turnovers. Naturally, that was impossible given the level of uncertainty during spring break. So we had to change that around.”

Marshall explained that, although not all clauses of the constitution were rigorously followed, “the Constitution does not account for a global pandemic. The Executive Board has done their best to work within the constitution and the rules of the Academy.”

Given lost time, Horrigan expects “playing catch-up” in the Executive Board for their remaining terms in office. He pointed out that the board will need time to polish the structure and organization of online StuCo, work out the virtual operation of committees, plan Tuesday meetings and resolve constitutional conflicts that StuCo currently neglect.

According to Horrigan, the Constitution will likely undergo change “as a result of a newfound commitment from the whole Exec Board.” Possible edits include reducing the number of total voting members, allocating more money to dorms, altering the voting structure and adding a State of Emergency clause so that StuCo “never finds itself in a constitutional bind like this ever again.”

Nevertheless, Lisa looked forward to using Canvas to virtually welcome all students to participate in Zoom sessions. “We still have so many passionate and dedicated StuCo members that I am very optimistic about our club this year,” she said.