Student Council Reforms Elections Process

By Joonyoung Heo and Forrest Zeng 

In early December, Student Council members voted to implement a new policy for election reform, set to take effect in the upcoming election cycle. 

This policy included two amendments to the Student Council Constitution. The first amendment allowed three presidential candidates — as opposed to the conventional two — to advance to the primary election. The second amendment created the Election Remedy Group (ERG) to reinforce the security and legitimacy of elections. The ERG consists of Student Council faculty advisors, the Executive Board, and the Election Committee Co-Chairs. 

A mandate from Principal William Rawson was partly the impetus behind the reform policy. Following the toxicity around the previous year’s presidential election, the Academy administration felt resolved to prevent such incidents in the future.

“Principal Rawson gave us a principle charge after that election,” Council Vice President and senior Grace Puchalski said. “He asked the current board to reform the election cycle and gave us a timeline. In the last two years, there have been many issues, not just with election toxicity, but even who’s going to end up being president. That meant a lot of meetings with the board, our advisors, the Elections Committee Co-Chairs, and of course Principal Rawson himself.”

“Once we got the mandate, the co-chairs created a task force to discuss constitutional amendments and committee rules for campaigning,” Council Co-Secretary and upper Kevin Treehan said. “Everything was to streamline the elections process and make the campaigning and voting process more equitable.”

While the charge itself came from Rawson, student initiative also played a large role in driving reform. 

“There were a lot of student voices pushing for this reform policy,” Council President and senior Ale Murat said. “Myself, candidates in previous elections, other members of Student Council, [and] the student body in general could see that this was a culmination of all the toxicity and controversy over Council elections. It was very much a collective effort in that sense.”

“It’s always been an issue,” Puchalski said. “Election reform has been called for in previous cycles. I think it just took a push from the principal to say that something needed to be changed, and it needed to be set in stone within the system of Student Council.”

The new election policy will allow the administration to take a more involved role in Council elections in resolving election irregularities. 

“If an irregularity is reported, the Co-Chairs will investigate and take it to the ERG,” Elections Committee Co-Chair and senior Tucker Gibbs said. “The group has functions built in to ensure that Deans and other faculty members are consulted, but much of the discussion and communication with Student Council [will be] led by the ERG. Then, by a two-thirds majority vote, the ERG can fix the irregularity by any means necessary.”

“In case there are attacks on personhood or anything that violates Academy rules in the future, [the] Student Council isn’t able to hold people responsible,” Murat said. “That’s why it was important to have multiple discussions with the principal and other faculty members.”

“Principal Rawson is very clear that he wants Student Council to remain a sovereign body,” Treehan added. “The administration will only come into play if we reach the point we’ve been at for the past couple of years and even then only through a structured approach as part of the ERG. We’re hoping we won’t find ourselves in that situation in the first place with our campaigning rules.”

Many of these changes will become apparent in the coming spring election cycle. The amendment changing the primary presidential election to advance three candidates to the voting stage, for instance, was designed to decrease toxicity from the one-on-one dynamics of previous presidential elections. 

“One-on-one runoffs get very competitive,” Gibbs said. “We’ve found that the presidential election is one of the only ones with that kind of competition, and we believe it’s because of the position itself and that two-party dynamic. Obviously, we can’t detract from the position, so we decided to eliminate the one-on-one aspect. With three people, it’s much more difficult to target one candidate. We hope that’ll decrease toxicity.”

In addition to changing the presidential election format, the reform policy will prohibit independent social media campaigning for any position. When 18 prep representative candidates were polled, the majority responded that this change did not prevent them from running an effective campaign. The committee also recommended shortening campaign durations and hosting public appearances for all candidates. 

“The social media ban is probably the number-one change people should be aware of,” Puchalski said. “In the past, [Instagram] has been a huge part of running for office, but that causes so many issues because people tend to say what they want [using their] online [platform] rather than in person. This year, candidates will have to get more creative with speeches and public appearances and a return to posters and chalk.”

“This is somewhat of a drastic change since social media has been the only way of campaigning these past couple of years,” Murat said. “Some people have even been discouraged from running because they don’t want to experience the scrutiny of online toxicity. So I hope this encourages students to voice their ideas and take part in Student Council.”

Many Student Council members are happy with the new changes to election policy and optimistic about the upcoming spring cycle.

“I was impressed by the Council’s work in coming up with a response plan,” Ewald dorm representative and upper Eric Li said. “I hope it’ll prevent similar incidents in the future.”

“Tucker and Will have done a fantastic job with the election reform,” Public Relations Committee Co-Chair and senior Enzo Nakornsri said. “Their ideas are very progressive, and I appreciate what they’re doing. Their hard work will pay off.” 

“I think the election reform is a brilliant idea, and I support it wholeheartedly,” lower and class representative Beverly Oleka said. “It’ll streamline the candidate campaigning process and elections in general. Tucker and Will did a wonderful job.”

“I was concerned about how it was sprung on the Council, and that might be something to review in the future, but I was happy that there was time to ask questions and discuss,” prep and class representative Andrew Gould said. “Clearly, the current system is not working, and we need to reform it. This is a great start.”

The Executive Board members are also looking forward to the road ahead.

“Election irregularities have been an ongoing issue long before I stepped into office last spring,” Murat said. “I really hope the work we’ve been putting in pays off. I am very confident that it will.”