The student union announced to community members the winners of the 2022 Spring election. Spring elections opened on April 4 at midnight and remained open for the entire day until 11:59 p.m., according to Student Union Secretary Michael Pollard’s ’22 email.
Community members were voting to fill the positions of Student Union President and Vice President, Secretary, Head Treasurer, Junior representative to the Board of Trustees, two representatives to the Brandeis Sustainability Fund Board, Allocations Board Member for a two-semester seat and Community Emergency and Enhancement Fund (CEEF) Representative.
Winning the president and vice president position for the 2022-2023 academic year is Peyton Gillespie ’24 and Lia Bergen ’24. The pair won 58.56 percent of the vote with 560 students voting for them. Gillespie and Bergen ran against Ariel Schultz ’24 and Elisha Gordan ’24, who received 22.07 percent of the vote with 196 students voting for the pair.
According to Gillespie’s candidate bio, the pair plan to tackle the following initiatives while holding their positions: crease access to free menstrual products using Student Union funds, improve campus transport for community members and integrate the university’s student union into the Boston intercollegiate Government to create a network to collaborate with other student governments in the greater Boston area.
Ashna Kelkar ’24 won the Secretary position against Emma Fiesinger ’23 and Gonzalo Palafox ’24. Kelkar received 34.02 percent of the vote with 297 students voting in support. Fiesinger received 25.20 percent of the vote with 220 votes in favor and Palafox received 14.43 percent of the vote.
Kelkar, in her candidate bio, said that as secretary she would work to increase transparency between the Student union and community members as well as administration. In this role, she also hopes to run successful and smooth elections, she wrote in her bio.
There was one seat open for Head Treasurer which was won by Maggie Chang ’23. Chang ran against Emily Adelson ’23 for the position, Chang won 43.09 percent of the vote with 377 votes. Adelson received 24.81 percent of the vote with 217 votes in favor. Multiple write-in options were provided for the Head Treasurer position including one vote for Chris Rock— notably in the media right now after getting punched by Will Smith at the Oscars.
Chang wrote in her candidate bio that if elected to this position she would become more familiar with the new treasury platform in order to provide community members with “smooth operations and experience” working with treasury.
Winning the one seat for Junior representative to the Board of Trustees is Shelley Polanco ’24. Polanco received more than the majority of the vote with 55.43 voting in favor of her. Polanco received 347 votes in favor of her. She ran against Meshulam Ungar who received 36.74 percent of the vote with 230 votes. There was a write-in option for Robert Downey Jr. as Junior representative to the Board of Trustees.
Polanco wrote in her candidate bio that if elected to the position she would focus on creating a wholesome student experience, advocate for better distribution of resources to cultural spaces on campus and engage the student body into the Brandeis experience.
There were two seats open for the Brandeis Sustainability Fund Board, and three students ran for the position: Aman Qutab ’24, Ana Loza Pérez ’25 and Max Lerner ’23. Qutab and Pérez won the two seats with 23.62 percent and 35.04 percent of the vote respectively. Lerner received 20.87 percent of the vote.
One initiative Qutab addressed in her candidate bio that she would like to make possible in this position is a clothes drive event at the university. She would like community members to donate lightly used or unused clothing to be donated to charity rather than having clothes be thrown away. Pérez wrote in her bio that in this position she would like to advocate for sustainability projects on campus and would be committed to providing support to access the necessary resources and funds for sustainability initiatives driven by the community.
There were two seats open for the Allocations Board position with four students running for the seats: Jacqueline Floro ’25, Lexi Lazar ’24, Peter Meng ’23 and Owen Chan ’25. Floro and Lazar won the seats with 24.76 percent and 26.58 percent of the vote respectively. Meng received 18.06 percent of the vote and Chan received 10.33 percent of the vote.
In her candidate bio, Floro wrote that in this position she would work with students and staff to better meet their needs for the clubs they are advocating for. Lazar wrote that in this position she would want to make marathon more equitable for cultural groups on campus, according to her bio.
For the CEEF Representative Carolina Jacobs ’25 ran unopposed. Jacobs received 69.78 percent of the vote with 635 votes in favor. Jacobs wrote that in this position she would like to help in the process of approving and executing student projects.
“I want to thank all of the candidates for running and the rest of the student body for voting. For those of you still interested in joining the Student Union, there will be more positions available later in the semester,” Pollard wrote to community members.
Results of the elections were released to students on April 5, in an email sent by Pollard to community members. According to the vote breakdown, 1270 individuals voted in the election.
