Elections of Student Self Governance
On January 21, Ilia State University held elections of Student Self Governance. The elections of Student Self Governance of fourth convocation will enter in ISU’s history as the most tense and unpredictable elections with interesting and competitive pre election period. Four student organizations “Ilia’s Student Association”, “Iliauni United Force”, “Iliauni Campus” and “Ilia’s Student Dream” were competing with each other.
All four organizations are more or less popular among students. As for the principles and promises of organizations, there were differences, but naturally not fundamental. The important issue was who would win student’s trust. Their promises consisted of protecting student’s interests, adopting the role of mediator between students and administration, implementing exchange programs and educational events, also planning and organizing cultural, sports and other projects.
The pre-election period was also interesting. Competing organizations carried out more or less active PR campaign. Also several keen public debates were held between leaders and members of the presented organizations. The topic of the debate was their views and plans if coming in the self governance.
Finally, results. From the total number of voters, (10 804 student) 3131 student participated in elections. Participation of the organization’s delegates with proportional and majoritarian systems was 160 and 129. All four organizations crossed seven percent barrier for entering student self governance. The winner is “Ilia’s Student Association”, from this organization with proportional and majoritarian list 47 members will enter governance, from “Iliauni United Forces” 13 members, “Iliauni Campus” 15 members and from “Ilia’s Student Dream” 7 representatives will become members of student self governance. In total, the number of elected candidates with majoritarian system is 42 and with proportional - 40.