Amidst the worldwide pandemic, the current Student Council and Class Board have to improvise how campaigns and elections for next year’s members will work. For the first time ever, candidates will both campaign and be elected online.

“The Class Board and Student Council sponsors engaged in a series of conversations – via email, Zoom meetings, and document sharing – to discuss how to adapt the existing format to this unique situation,” Director of Student Activities Peter Geddeis said. “We started discussing this year’s elections back at the beginning of March, and those conversations evolved over the subsequent weeks.”

Applications must be completed by April 23, and candidates must join an online meeting April 24 at 3 p.m. to review application and campaign requirements, Geddeis said. Campaigning will begin April 24, and students will be sent a link to an online ballot April 27 to begin voting through May 22. 

“I think that the greatest difficulty will be ensuring that all students receive the link to their respective ballot,” Geddeis said. “We’re talking about 3,000 plus students, and we want the process to go as smoothly and efficiently as possible.”

Student Council and Class Board have been trying to move more of their operations online regardless of the pandemic and they are learning how to improve the process, Geddeis said.

“The progress before had a lot of steps online so moving the rest wasn’t a challenge but definitely a big change,” Taylor Schullo ‘21, Student Council Vice President candidate, said. “We can continue moving forward especially for next year.”

Schullo and other students running will be expected to campaign online by recording their speeches and advertising on their social media. 

“[Student Council and Class Board] had to get rid of student signatures so I think I lost a big part of my campaigning,” Schullo said. “Instead I am going to really work on my speech and let the other students know, who can vote, that I am running because I lost that aspect. I hope that I can be remembered when people vote.”