The first round of voting for the 2014-2015 School Co-Presidential elections took place last Monday, with a record 85 percent participation from the student body. Six of 10 candidate pairs moved forward to the second round of voting.
These six candidate pairs are Uppers Arthur Doran and Antonia Leggett, Sina Golkari and Tessa Peterson, David Gutierrez and Rebecca Somer, Carter Page and Hanover Vale, Corinne Singer and Juan Pablo Villarreal, and Kinsey Yost and Andrew Zheng. The candidate pool will be narrowed to two pairs tonight.
Unlike previous years, Junius Williams ’14 and Clark Perkins ’14, current Co-Presidents, released the voting percentages each candidate pair received in their email to the student body on Monday night. Each voter was able to vote for up to six pairs.
Gutierrez and Somer received the most votes, as 68.3 percent of the 954 voters voted in support of the pair. 61.4 percent voted for Singer and Villarreal and for Golkari and Peterson, 59.3 percent for Yost and Zheng, 56.8 percent for Page and Vale and 53.8 percent for Doran and Leggett.
“We found that in our past years of experience with elections, it would have been immensely helpful to know where we stood and to know the numbers. We found there have been lots of students who have been curious to know the numbers themselves, so we sought to present the hard numbers in the most legitimate fashion,” said Williams.
The two female-female and two male-male pairs were eliminated after the first round of voting, and all six pairs that made it through to the second round consisted of one boy and one girl. Since the conception of the Co-President election model last year, more girls have put themselves forward, said Paul Murphy, Dean of Students. “We’ve had some years in the recent past where only two or three girls have run,” he said.
The six candidate pairs participated in a debate hosted by Williams and Perkins past Wednesday.
On March 26, the remaining two pairs will take part in a final forum at All-School Meeting.
“It’s great to see so many pairs and so much diversity,” said Perkins.
