Sabbatical Elections – Voting Now Open
Friday 22 Feb 2008
Isn’t democracy empowering? You’ve met the candidates and read their manifestos and now it is decision time. Voting is now open here and will close at 23.50 on Tuesday. Check out the elections coverage in Felix and then decide who you would like to run your Union next year. Our 8 NUS delegate positions are also hotly contested so have a quick read of their views and vote to decide who Imperial College Union will be sending to the Dickensian squalor of Blackpool Wintergardens for NUS Annual Conference 2008 from 1-3 April 2008!
Even if your chosen candidate dosen’t win your vote still counts!
So by now you have probably been harassed by several different candidates and having made an informed decision about who would be the best set of people to lead our Union next year you want to get on with casting your vote. Voting online is a very easy process and can be done at imperialcollegeunion.org/vote.
All Union elections are run using the system of Single Transferable Vote (STV) as recommended by the Electoral Reform Society as being the most democratic way of counting votes. I will not bore you with the intricacies of STV but should you wish to learn more there is lots of material available on the internet.
When voting you will be asked to rank the candidates numerically with the candidate you put a “1” by being your favourite. If your preferred candidate is eliminated then your second preference is taken in to account and so on and so forth. What this means is that it is important to assess all the candidates and ask your self the question “if X doesn’t win then who else do I think would be quite good?” Remember, these elections are so hotly contested that some of the posts could be decided by transferred votes so please remember to indicate who you would like to win if your chosen candidate should fail. Re-open Nominations (dear old RON) stands fully seconded in all Union elections so if you think that all or some of the candidates are not up to it then you are free to put RON in your rankings as you see fit.
Vote in ALL the elections and get 50p for a club of your choice
The Union is stronger with higher turnout in Officer elections so as an additional incentive for you to log on to the electronic ballot box you have the opportunity to raise a bit of extra money for your favourite society. If you vote in all the NUS Delegate, Student Trustee and Sabbatical Officer elections you get to allocate 50p to one of the Union’s several hundred clubs. 50p might not sound a lot but it soon adds up if lots of you vote.
Officer and Faculty Union elections – Nominations Now Open
Nominations are now open for the following positions and will close at 0.01am on Monday 3 March.
Council Chair
RAG Chair
Community Action Group Chair
Equal Opportunities Officer
Welfare Campaigns Officer
Royal College of Science Union Officers
City and Guilds College Union Officers
The medics Faculty Union will be running their elections next term so if you are a student in the Faculty of Medicine look out for notice of the timetable later in the year. For more information about any of these positions email president@imperial.ac.uk and I will put you in touch with the relevant person.