The first student election under the management of the University Board of Elections proceeded without any major hitches, UBE President Brian Cook said yesterday.
"Given the limited time we had to put together this election, it was a resounding success," Cook said.
Cook said the UBE plans to send an e-mail to the University student body within the next week to garner interest in participating on next year's board.
UBE member Justin Bernick said new members will become part of a vastly improved system, despite its rapid creation.
"This year was much more successful, mainly because of the general quality of the people on the board," Bernick said.
Bernick emphasized the amount of time and dedication this year's board members put into organizing the election.
More endorsing organizations participated in this year's election process and more schools expressed interest in the new system, Bernick said.
The system also drew a higher number of voters than usual. Bernick attributed the high voter turnout this year to the new election process.
"I think the average voter realizes that this method takes their preferences into account," Bernick said.
One of the larger changes to the election process, the institution of an instant runoff voting system, which requires voters to rank their choices rather than choose one single winner, did not factor into the election this year.
The IRV process was not initiated because every winning Student Council candidate won enough first-ranked votes to constitute a majority.
Noah Sullivan, Student Council president-elect, won with 2,877 votes, 1,598 more than runner-up Greg Scanlon.
Other major changes to the election process this year included eliminating the candidate and endorsing organization expenditure limits and requiring candidates to submit interim and final expenditure reports so they can be held accountable for how much they spent.
Endorsing organizations also are required to submit expenditure reports if they are official endorsing organizations through the board.
"It's important to see how much the candidates are spending, to make the process as transparent as possible for the voters," Cook said.
The final expenditure reports originally were due March 8, but the deadline was moved to March 18 because of a simple mix-up -- the UBE did not realize it was during Spring Break.
Cook added that the board is considering creating an option that would give candidates the opportunity to voluntarily abide by an expenditure limit.
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