Student election suffers
from small voter turnout
 By
Kurt Esposito
Assistant Campus Editor
Only a small portion of the student body —
1,621 people - voted in the Purdue Student Government's senate election.
But only 738 needed to.
Because of a lack of candidates, 883 students voted
for candidates that needed one vote to win.
The schools of Liberal Arts, Management and Science
were the only schools that had debatable races, and, therefore, were
the only ones that needed voter turnout. All of the other schools had
two or fewer people run, so as long as the candidates received one vote,
they won.
The Schools of Engineering had more students vote
than any other school — 367, while Liberal Arts had 290, Science
had 253 and Management had 215.
Colleen O'Connor, PSG chief of staff, said most
students probably logged onto SSINFO to vote for Homecoming and noticed
they could vote for the Student Senate, as well, and did so even though
they didn’t have to.
She said she still would have liked to see more
students voting in the schools where there was a race.
The senators were voted upon in Purdue's first
campuswide Student Senate election — senators were previously appointed
based on housing. The new senate replaces the temporary senate put in
place after the last senate was dissolved following a restructuring
of the organization in April.
All five temporary senators who ran to again serve
on the senate were elected. The new senate also features former PSG
members.
To address the lack of student turnout in the election
— in both candidates and voters — PSG is planning to set up
a committee to look at the election.
Sean Cowley, Liberal Arts senator and the temporary
senate's president pro tempore, said the lack of student candidates
and votes can be attributed to PSG's lack of engagement on the campus.
He said the organization needs to do more programming
and make the students aware that it exists. "A lot of students don’t
realize what PSG is doing for them," he said. He also said more students
will want to get involved if they see what PSG is doing.
Cowley said he would like to see the committee
look at campaign finance, an issue that was considered during this month's
elections. The election bylaws allow for student organizations outside
PSG to endorse candidates but prohibit them from contributing any financial
assistance.
Cowley said that there is no way for PSG to enforce
the rule. "Theoretically these organizations could put out 300 fliers
on campus and the candidate could just deny they were there, and nothing
could be done," he said.
Two seats are still open for both the University
Division and Graduate School and one seat is open for the School of
Education.
Students interested in the positions can contact
Jennifer Jacobson by phone at 494-7201 or at the PSG office in Stewart
Center, Room G6.
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