The 12 recently elected members of the Senior Executive Committee gathered together Friday at Blunt Alumni Center to appoint eight members for the committee. The elected chose from those candidates who lost in last week's elections, and members reached a consensus after three hours of discussion.
"We were looking for people that represented a cross-section of campus," elected representative John Valdez '07 said. "We wanted a group that was representative of the College as a whole."
The Senior Executive Committee is the main representative organization of the senior class for the next five years. Its responsibilities include selecting a faculty speaker, an orator and historians for Class Day and class marshals and flag bearers for Commencement. It also organizes a five year reunion.
"It is a good way to keep the class in touch," Valdez said. "It provides a different representation of the class of '07."
Last year, the eight appointed candidates were selected by Assistant Dean of the College Teoby Gomez, Assistant Director of Young Alumni and Student Programs Rex Morey '99 and Director of Student Activities Linda Kennedy. The system was designed to allow for a greater diversity in the committee.
The process, however, led to a committee that was divided between those students who were elected and those who were appointed. Students complained about the aloofness of the committee, and there was outrage on campus when five class marshals were also members of the Senior Executive Committee. All five class marshals later stepped down.
No such controversy surrounded this year's new selection process.
Many students also complained about the lack of transparency in the election process itself. Last year, the senior class was forced to vote three times due to technical difficulties, and the results of the election were never published. This year, for the first time, election results were blitzed out to the senior class with the number of votes each candidate received.
The appointed SEC members will be Alexander Garisson, Katherine Amato, Kevin Hudak, Michael Amico, Paul Dupuy, Samantha Sheppard, Shala Byers and Wilson Handler. Jacob Crumbine, Pooja Viswanath, Valdez, David Zubricki, Julie Chang, Jesse Shaw, Luke Antal, Cristina Churchill, Sam Routhier, Esther Perman, Lorraine Buhannic and Christopher Chan were elected last week.
"The SEC group this year is very strong. There are many qualified seniors at Dartmouth that could have done the job," Sebastian Restrepo '07, a candidate who was not elected or appointed, said. "The 12 elected and eight selected members are some of the best that Dartmouth has to offer."
