Following the events of previous years, SGA has altered its elections
The campaign period for the Student Government Association elections have begun. Those elected this spring will serve from the day they are installed this coming fall until their successor is installed early in the Fall of 2026.
As always, one of two seats, which are granted to every college by the SGA Constitution, is up for grabs. This time around, most candidates running for collegiate seats are running uncontested, virtually securing their seats for the next term, while no student is running to represent those in the Collins College of Business. Candidates running to represent the international students, transfers, students residing in various living communities on campus, commuters, and the student body at-large are all running uncontested as well.
In fact, there are only three positions that are contested: the College of Engineering and Computer Science senate seat, the vice presidency and the presidency. Former junior senator Thomas Hurst and candidate Kaden Davis are running for the ECS seat. Internal Affairs Committee chair and Senator Beckham Schell is running to be the next SGA Vice President as is SGA secretary Holden Caldwell. Finally, the chair of the Constituency Engagement Committee and Senator Kadee Jo Ransom is running to be the next president against Michael Combs, the current president.
Also on the ballot is an updated version of the SGA Constitution, which passed Senate unanimously after being debated and altered several times. The most notable difference between the current Constitution and what would become the new Constitution if ratified by the student body is in relation to punishments. Under the current Constitution, anyone who loses the trust of SGA is prohibited from ever holding office again. This change came after the disaster that was the 2024 Spring election. Last year, this clause prevented the person who won the majority vote from becoming president and caused an At-Large senator who received over 400 votes during his election to be kicked out of his seat. Under the proposed Constitution, the punishment would be determined by Judicial and approved by the SGA advisor rather than an action resulting in an automatic disqualification.
Prior to the opening of campaigning, Senate also voted to approve changes to the Elections Code. The main change between the current Elections Code and the previous one is the penalties section, which now has a tier system. Whereas the previous system left punishments to be decided at the discretion of the Elections Committee without any proper guidelines, the current system lays out actions the committee can take if it finds that someone has violated the Elections Code with those actions correlating with the severity of the violation.
While this version of the Elections Code is a step up from the previous version, it still has some severe shortcomings. For one, the tier system is vague, using terms such as “egregious or flagrant” and “petty” to describe violations without providing examples of what actions fall into which category. Another issue is that the penalties give the Elections Committee the ability to take away votes depending on the violation committed and the position the candidate is running for. In doing so, the committee is essentially disqualifying the votes of individual students rather than punishing the candidate for their actions.
Despite these issues, it, as well as the proposed new Constitution are far better than the previous Elections Code and current Constitution. Hopefully with these new changes, SGA and the student body can avoid any big issues like the ones of previous years and this time around, the decisions of the student body will be respected.
