Pravin Rajan (SFS ’07), Dito Mas (COL ’07), Vikram Agrawal (SFS ’07) and Ed Duffy (SFS ’07) won the four seats in the eleven-way race for GUSA freshman representatives on Thursday,. Nick Lizop (COL ’05), running unopposed, won the open seat in the junior representative election.

Election Commission Chair Lisa Lombardo (COL ’04) announced the results last Thursday night in Sellinger Lounge after a brief introduction by GUSA President Brian Morganstern (COL ’05). Speaking to all the candidates present, Lombardo said, “Good job guys. It was a nice clean election.”

Lizop received only 40.1 percent of the junior vote despite running unopposed. Various write in candidates accounted for the remaining 59.9 percent. Voter turnout for the junior elections was less than 15 percent with only 207 students voting.

“I thought it was a little sad,” Lucy Malcolm (COL ’05) said. “The candidate statement we got e-mailed meant nothing because [Lizop] was the only choice. I guess our year has been completely disillusioned with GUSA in general.”

Rajan received the most votes in the freshman election with 15.1 percent but was closely followed by Mas at 15.0 percent. Agrawal and Duffy received 14.6 percent and 10.8 percent of the vote, respectively. In total, 1,889 votes were cast in the freshman election, although each student was permitted to vote for four candidates.

The announcement climaxed four days of intense campaigning on the freshman side. A debate between the freshman candidates) was held Tuesday evening in Reiss 264 and broadcast live on GUTV.

All the campaigns focused on several key issues such as the residence hall security policy, residence hall sanitation and the FRIENDS Initiative.

“All the campaigns that won were based on a lot of similar issues,” Duffy said. After the election there appeared to be a unified message coming from the four newly-elected representatives. They stressed the fact that while they may not be able to solve all the problems that arise, the purpose of their positions is to be an intermediary between the students and the administration.

“It’s all about networking. If something is happening on campus that [freshmen] don’t like, they have someone to contact now,” Rajan said.

Both Agrawal and Rajan said that their favorite part about campaigning was getting to know so many of their peers. “I think students liked how candidates went door to door instead of just hanging up posters,” Agrawal said. “It would have been nice to get to know every single freshman.”

Rajan had a similar message. “I had the least put-together campaign when it comes to posters and flyers,” he said. “I knew that if I was going to win, it was going to be by word of mouth. If you are going to represent people, you have to talk to them.”

Most candidates admitted that the campaign was a learning experience. Duffy said, “It was obvious that New South has different problems than Village C does. If we can point people in the right direction, not necessarily fix everything ourselves, then we are doing our job.”

Addressing the same issue, Rajan said, “New South wanted paper towels and soap. These are basic needs. The Harbin five boys haven’t had soap since the first week of school. That’s what you learn by talking to people individually.”