Candidates gear up for student govt. races

The Nominations and Elections Committee recently released a list of this year's candidates for the Undergraduate Assembly and class boards, jumpstarting a campaign period that will come to a head next Monday when voting ends. There are 53 candidates seeking a spot on the 33-member body this year. Only 25 seats will be contested in this round of elections, which begins today, with the other eight going to freshmen in the fall. Though at least 60 percent of last year's UA candidates were Greek, the number of Greeks seeking seats has dropped this year to around 50 percent. It was unclear last night whether four of the candidates are affiliated with fraternities or sororities. Sixteen of this year's 33-member UA chose to run for re-election and current Chairperson Bill Conway, a Wharton junior, is not one of them. Eight of the potential incumbents are freshmen. UA Vice Chairperson Michael Bassik, who is one of two members of the current UA executive board to seek re-election, said students should not read too much into the large exodus of members. "[There is] a respectable amount of UA members seeking re-election, which is a sign of confidence in the organization as a whole," the College sophomore said. Last year, a similar number of seat-holders chose not to run for re-election. UA Treasurer and Wharton sophomore Jonathan Glick, who is the only other member of the current executive board eyeing re-election, also highlighted the number of students seeking seats on the UA. "I think that there is an increased interest in the UA partly because of the effective year that we have had," Glick said. "Since we no longer have the 'apathetic body' label attached to us, students truly want to get involved." There are 23 candidates running for 16 available seats in the College of Arts and Sciences. In addition to Bassik, also seeking re-election for the College seats are junior Michael Silver, sophomore John Buchanan and freshmen Wendy Shiekman, Kim Rittberg, Rohan Ramakrishna, Matt Kraus and Dana Hork. The rest of the candidates include juniors Megan Davidson, Jeremy Fingerman and Artur Pylak; sophomores Nicholas Athanassiou, Alex Moskowitz and Connor Wilson; and freshmen Tara Brenner, Dan Diamond, Joshua Klein, Taylor Megdal, Rachel Mendelsohn, Jo Piazza, Vincent Ricci, Vishal Shah and Carrie Zaslow. Moskowitz and Piazza are Daily Pennsylvanian staff members. The race for the four available Wharton seats promises to be tight, with 12 candidates -- five of whom are incumbents -- in the running. The five incumbents are junior Ryan Robinson, sophomores Glick and Rishi Bajaj and freshmen Dave Burd and Dana Becker. Challengers to the incumbents are Jonathan Jungblut; sophomores Brian Godfrey, James Luciana, Robert Lewin, John McKenzie and David Peretz; and freshman Zach Sheinberg. "As far as the Wharton seats go, it will be a very hard election," Glick said. "If I told you I think I am an easy in, I would be lying my pants off." There are seven candidates running for four seats available in the School of Engineering and Applied Science, including sophomore incumbents Theo LeCompte and Mo Saraiya and freshman incumbent Anna Marie Lipski. Sophomores Jed Fonner and Krista Phol and freshmen Michael Krouse and Michael Lorberbaum are vying for the remaining seats. There is one candidate running for the lone Nursing seat, newcomer Kimberly Colopinto. Elections for class boards also begin today. Junior Class President Lisa Marshall in the College faces Matthew Benbassat, a former Daily Pennsylvanian credit manager, in Wharton in the race for senior class president. All other candidates for the senior class board are running unopposed and there is no candidate for the position of Nursing representative. While there are three candidates for junior class president, the rest of the positions on the board have had difficulty attracting candidates. Currently, no one is running for secretary, treasurer, vice president for corporate sponsorship, College representative or Nursing representative. Sophomore Class President Ray Valerio is not running for re-election, citing his interest in studying in Washington, D.C., next fall. Valerio's absence leaves the field wide open for newcomers Lewin, Peretz and the College's Brett Taxin to compete for the position. Valerio cited several reasons for the lack of junior class board candidates, including an uninformed class, fear of competition from incumbents, a heavy academic workload and "general apathy." By contrast, five candidates -- including incumbent Alex Tolbert of the College -- are running in what promises to be an extremely competitive race for sophomore class president. The other candidates are Krouse, Mendelsohn, Adam Mait of the College and Engineering's Christi Electris. There are candidates for all other sophomore class board positions, except the Engineering representative. All positions that remain unfilled after the election will be filled through appointments made by the class boards themselves -- usually done in conjunction with the NEC. Appointments will most likely be made in the fall.

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