Julia Balistreri (The Beacon)
By Julia Balistreri, Guest Commentary
Elections are over and I am exhausted. Since the moment I hit campus I have put all of my time and effort into Wednesday's ASUP Senator elections, and I am thrilled with the results. Last spring, the Executive Board and myself all ran with similar goals: make ASUP more transparent and get students more involved. Sitting at my desk on the Friday applications were due, I saw this goal achieved. We almost had enough candidates (only two seats were left open) to fill the Senate and even then there were still contested positions. In all the time I have been on campus, I have never seen such a large turnout for this election. And in return for how much enthusiasm the candidates showed I did my best to make sure students were aware of the election.
Though Senate has been my family since I arrived at UP, I understand that not many students know of Senate and I wanted to do everything in my power to make students aware of our existence. With the help of my brilliant Elections Committee, we set up more tabling spots and interacted with more students than ever before. For the past two days, the Elections Committee and I have been stationed at the entrance to Franz, in the Cove and the Commons, offering up our laptops to students to vote and the response was phenomenal.
Tonight as the polls closed at eight, I was jumping up and down in St. Mary's because Pilots, you rocked it this year. A record number of you voted and every single election was valid, which means that every single one of you now has three senators (residence, class and major) representing you and your voice. The huge voter turnout signaled to me that, as the Executive Board, we are fulfilling our goals of becoming more transparent and I hope that, in the future, this trend continues and you feel comfortable contacting us, or your senators with any compliments or concerns regarding life on The Bluff. Thank you for voting and showing your support for the candidates because you have made every stress absolutely worth it. Remember that our senate meetings are open to all and we would love to see you there. Our next meeting is this Monday at 4:30p.m. in Shiley 301. Fr. John Donato, Associate Vice President for Student Development, will be speaking so come with any questions for him, or just to check us out. Hope to see you there!
Julia Balistreri is a senior chemistry major and the ASUP secretary. She can be reached at balistre13@up.edu
