ASB and class elections concluded, used new voting system

There’s a first time for everything. This year was the first time in a decade that voting for ASB officers took place in the quad. Almost 300 students voted in the election.

Junior Haley Zarrin was elected president along with sophomore David Mandell as vice president, junior Annie Lee as treasurer, junior Cindy Chang as secretary and junior Natalie Tkalcevic as board representative. The ASB has now begun the process of choosing commissions. The newly elected officers hope to increase student representation and improve the school environment in the coming year.

The ASB used the quad this year to set up optional voting booths instead of handing out ballots to every second-period or fifth-period classroom. Zarrin was one of the current ASB members who supported this change in voting procedures.

“The voting in the quad actually eliminated the people who randomly vote,” said Zarrin. “Only people who actually cared and took the time to vote [cast their ballot].”

Zarrin said this system enhanced the efficiency and quality of the election process and gave students a more accurate understanding of how voting really works in the world.

Others, such as Chang, however, disliked the new method.

“A lot of people will vote for you in class, but they won’t go out of their way and vote for you [in the quad],” said Chang. “There’s too little publicity and people don’t even know about it.”

Chang also felt that optional voting in the quad makes organizing the votes harder for the ASB candidates and the elections commission.

Despite differing opinions on the ASB’s change in voting procedures this year, the election ran smoothly.

Elections for class officers and school site council representatives took place on Friday, May 22. The senior class elected Maddy Renalds as president, Chelsea Sabella as vice president, Ameeka Shenoy as treasurer, Aveena Shenoy as secretary, Stephanie Borsum and Brian Kim as class representatives. Junior class officers will be Tim Rollinson, Michelle Wang, Pamela Lee, Jay Lee and Chris Chung. As for the sophomore class officers, Izzy Albert, Anika Jhalni, Krishnan Raman, Vasha Ramesh, Shivani Chadha and Nicole Shaman were chosen. And next year, the school site council representatives will be junior Jan Iyer, sophomores Synthia Ling and Pia Mishra and freshman Anshu Siripurapu.

The junior class treasurer is still yet to be determined due to issues with vote counting.