On February 11th, the elections for the executive team positions on Trinity Western University’s Student Association (TWUSA) were announced for the 2010/11 academic year. And the
winners are:
President: Dan Folkman (448 votes)
Vice President: Nathan Giede (362 votes)
Vice President of Finance: Jonathan Gibson (601 votes)
Vice President of Academic Relations: Katie Hawdon (594 votes)
Vice President of Student Relations: Danielle Rainsford (437 votes)
The voting polls were open for two days, bringing in a record-breaking number of 656 votes from TWU undergraduates, including part-time students.
“This is the most votes any Trinity election has ever gotten,” said Jason Brandl, executive vice president of TWUSA. In addition, TWUSA is a member of the American Student Government Association (ASGA) and had the highest student voting turn out in North America. “ASGA said the highest they’ve heard of is 33 percent, so that was our goal,” said Brandl.
“Having that kind of voter turnout is astounding,” said Nathan Tedrow, Vice President of Student Relations of TWUSA. Tedrow also confirmed that 36 per cent of TWU student participated in voting, a five percent increase from last year’s executive elections. “Most large universities get around three percent,” said Brandl.
Overall, Brandl says that this year’s executive elections were “the most involving” and had “the most positions contested for.” This leaves a reassuring feeling as the current and dedicated executive council steps down for other endeavours. Three students who were elected are currently on council, and Brandl believes that their new positions are something they can manage.
TWUSA’s vision for the 2009/10 is “students first,” however Tedrow says “it’s the charge of each executive council to figure out what the year’s supposed to look like. They might stick with ‘students first’ if the [2010/2011 executive team] feels it’s the mission statement they want to hold on to or they might figure out something that is more important.”
Whichever route the new executive team decides to take, TWU students can expect some great changes in the future. Congratulations to the winners.
