Students hope for positive change in UWSA

 

by Sandee Nho

University of Windsor students said they are feeling optimistic after an unprecedented election for a new student government.

On March 14, a campaign to vote ‘no’ on a slate of unchallenged incumbents succeeded. The campaign, called None of the Above, resulted in the ouster of the entire executive of the UWSA.

“It all started last Saturday,” said Mike Maher, a law student at the university and member of the campaign. “It was really to highlight the fact that there were procedural irregularities in the UWSA.”

Maher said people were not informed about the deadline to run for office and that shut out a lot of people who may have been interested.

“We saw that there were only 23 uncontested positions, ten vacancies and that the slates that were running into the executive and board of directors positions hadn’t really put out much information,” said Maher.

After being active three days before the campaigning ended the plan to mark none of the above on ballot sheets had a fast growing reaction.

“It started out with a small group of us who really started to get active in the organization of it,” said Maher. “And then by Tuesday, our group had probably grown to about 30 or 40 people.”

Rob Crawford, president of the UWSA, said he was surprised by the results.

“I wasn’t expecting it,” said Crawford. “I’ve never heard of this sort of result happening before. I mean, I was aware that there was a campaign encouraging students to vote none of the above, but quite honestly I didn’t think it was going to be successful.”

Crawford said the result of the election is a clear sign students aren’t happy with the way things have been operating. He said this means the UWSA is going to have to readdress the way the committee runs.

Despite the result, Stanford Cummings, a law student at the university, is anticipating a higher interest from the student body in how the school is governed.

“I think that it’s a good sign that the school got so engaged in the debate and the actual election itself,” said Cummings. “The None of the Above campaign addressed a lot of the procedural concerns that at least the law students had in terms of how this election was going to be undertaken to begin with.”

Maher said ever since word of the campaign began, students are becoming more aware of what goes on within the school.

“People are concerned. People are paying attention now and people want make sure that their student union is running and will happen.”

According to Crawford, the UWSA bylaws state that any empty positions after the general election will be included in the fall election. In the meantime, the UWSA full time staff will still be able to continue offering services to the students including administering health plans and planning events.