In an election marked by exceedingly low turnout, Phil Mone '02 will replace out-going class president Josh Warren '02 while Molly Stutzman '02 will assume the vice presidential position.
While voting stretched over two days, only 31.3 percent of eligible voters bothered to vote on an online ballot that took fewer than 30 seconds to complete.
A meager total of 298 votes was cast among the three presidential candidates of which Mone captured 138. Write-in candidates accounted for an additional 26 votes, or eight percent, a surprisingly high proportion.
For the second straight year a vice presidential candidate ran unopposed. Stutzman garnered 236 of a possible 265 total votes cast, representing a 26 percent response rate.
The 2001 Class Council elections last summer gained somewhat more attention than those held this summer. In an election with a total of 516 ballots cast, Collin O'Mara '01 won 274 votes while his runner up received 215.
This year, however, only 324 members of the Class of 2002 participated out of the 1034 enrolled this term. Several years ago elections were moved to Summer term to increase awareness and to take advantage of the fact that almost the entire class is in residence. Despite these efforts, this year's election was characterized by a very low turnout.
"It's disappointing," 2002 Class Dean Carolynne Krusi said of the turnout. "It's hard to figure out the reason for why that would be ... I hope that the class will try harder to get the word out in future elections."
Mone and Stutzman offered several reasons to explain the lack of participation.
Poor publicity, initial technical difficulties with the website and a large number of students living off-campus were among reasons cited by Mone, a biology major from Wellesley, MA.
The most important factor, Mone said, was that the elections did not weigh heavily on people's minds.
"People don't feel class council affects them enough to connect to a web-site and vote if it's not going to change their life in some small respect," Mone said. "You don't need more campaign time, you need more events that matter to people."
Mone said he did not mount a public campaign aside from putting up almost 10 flyers and sending out a few mass BlitzMail messages.
Stutzman concurred with Mone on reasons for the low turnout, and added that had an incumbent been running instead of three lesser-known candidates, turnout might have been higher.
"It wasn't a visible campaign," Stutzman said. "There weren't tons of posters all over the place and I didn't receive a lot of Blitzes about it. In retrospect, it might have been good to have a campaign period."
Krusi added that, in a class that is otherwise fairly active, she was surprised by the low turnout but hopes to see class council take on the challenge of trying to increase the number of students voting.
As the newly elected president, Mone's immediate goals include bringing different segments of campus together and to have new student involvement with the council by seeking out leaders from diverse campus groups.
Another focus, Mone said, is to plan well attended, class-unifying events at the beginning of each term, such as a class barbecue. He cited the recent Dartmouth Outing Club's sophomore trips that he helped organize as an example of such a successful event.
Heavily involved in the council her freshman and sophomore years, Stutzman brings knowledge and experience of council operations to the vice presidency.
Stutzman added that Mone, an outsider to class council, will bring a new perspective and hopefully new faces to join the ranks of current members.
"Phil has been involved in other organizations, and he'll get the people he knows interested, excited and involved in council," Stutzman said. She noted that her prime goals include raising enthusiasm for the class council, attracting new people and making sure juniors returning from their off-terms quickly become reacquainted with what occurred during their absence.
