The Class of 2030 elected eight senators to represent their class in Dartmouth Student Government for the academic year: Maxwell Corbett ’30, Cayden Dunn ’30, Henry Gillibrand ’30, Charlie Kahn ’30, Timothy Kempton ’30, Vanna Lei ’30, Florence Liu ’30 and Bensu Unal ’30. Dartmouth Elections Planning and Advisory Committee chair Noah Amidon ’27 said there were 24 candidates on the ballot in the election, voting for which ran from Oct. 12 at 5 p.m. to Oct. 13 at 5 p.m.
This was the first election to elect DSG senators by class rather than housing community.
All eight senators for the Class of 2030 sat down with The Dartmouth to share their goals for their new positions.
Dunn said he places “strong importance on speaking out for others” and plans to focus on “ensuring that everyone’s voices are heard” by Dartmouth’s administration.
Dunn added that his campaign was “built upon the fact that I’m not offering any campaign promises.”
“I’m not saying all campaign promises are stupid,” he said, “But I do think a lot of campaign promises leave mouths with no food. They’re not feeding people, they’re not coming to fruition.”
Dunn said he is “excited” to serve alongside the new senators.
“There’s a lot of strong voices, there’s a lot of strong platforms,” he said. “We’re going to get some really good work done here on campus.”
Corbett’s campaign proposals were inspired by issues he noticed in his first term at Dartmouth, he said.
“When I go to the Hop or Novack, I’ll get a meal deal, but it costs a swipe plus a couple extra bucks,” he said. “I feel like a meal swipe, if something is advertised as a meal, should cost a swipe. You shouldn’t have to dip into your DBA.”
Corbett said he also plans on “lobbying the government and economics departments to get rid of the enforced median for intro classes.”
“Dartmouth, if it wants to call itself a liberal arts institution, I think it’s hypocritical to try to dissuade people from taking classes by adding an enforced median,” he said. “Let people explore and see if it’s something that they might be interested in first before trying to push them out.”
Liu said she was not involved in student government in high school, but that being a senator was something she “wanted to explore here at Dartmouth” because she previously “never had time to.”
“One of my biggest passions is community service,” she said. “I think in a college environment, being a student senator or working in student government, a big part of that is community service.”
Gillibrand said the “proliferation of surveillance around the campus” is a “point of outrage and shock” for him, referring to Safety and Security’s installation of cameras in Greek spaces.
“I think this is extremely unpopular within the community,” Gillibrand said. “People deserve a right to privacy. People do not deserve to be spied on. I think it is the role of class representatives and our senators, even as freshmen, to push back on this kind of surveillance and this direction.”
Gillibrand also said he believes it is “preposterous” that students are unable to use their dining dollars and meal swipes at restaurants in Hanover.
Unal said she will work on extending hours at the Hinman Mail Station and creating “a safer campus with better located crosswalks.”
“I noticed that because in front of Topliff, we don’t have a crosswalk,” she said. “So people have to jaywalk, and it’s kind of dangerous.”
Unal is also “really excited” to have discussions with senators and work through disagreements on “complex issues” during meetings.
Kempton said he chose to run for DSG because he “loves the school,” and while he “feels like it’s great overall,” he has seen “a bunch of little things that could be changed.”
“I’m not hoping as a senator to try and change these huge structural components of the school because I just have one vote in a large senate and a large school,” he said. “But there are a lot of little things I saw … that I thought could just make your lives better, and wouldn’t be too hard to change.”
Khan said he ran for DSG to “help improve the Dartmouth community” and “improve relationships between the administration and the students.”
Lei said her campaign focused on offering “more realistic policies” to improve campus life, such as adding step stools to laundry rooms so shorter students can reach top dryers.
“I was focusing more on small problems with immediate fixes that could be pretty easy to achieve if we prioritize it,” she said.
Lei also campaigned on creating a grab-and-go umbrella system on campus that functions “like the Green2Go boxes.”
Timothy Kempton ’30 is an opinion columnist for The Dartmouth. He was not involved in writing or editing this article.
Alex Klee ’29 is a reporter from Woodbridge, Conn. He plans to major in economics and minor in math. He enjoys live music, skating and climbing.
