The recent Camosun College Student Society (CCSS) election, which took place from April 3 to 5, had three times the number of student votes cast compared with previous years’ average turnouts. Out of 9,369 students currently registered at Camosun, 1,223 voted—a voter turnout much larger than the CCSS average of approximately 400.
Rachael Grant has been re-elected as the CCSS external executive. Luke Mione got in as the CCSS Lansdowne executive, while Dana Campbell is the new Interurban executive.
Wyatt Matthews has been elected as the CCSS finance executive, and Karen Kanoga is now the CCSS international director. Solomon Lindsay, who was recently interviewed by Nexus for his extra-curricular community activities, is the new CCSS sustainability director.
Chris Smithson is now the CCSS pride director, and Srijani Nath is the CCSS women’s director. Melanie Winter was elected as the CCSS students with disabilities director; Winter is also now the Interurban student representative on Camosun College’s board of governors.
The election ballots also had a referendum question, which passed. The question asked whether or not Camosun students supported a 25-cent-per-month increase in student fees toward the Walk Safer program. 679 students said yes, while 544 said no.
Grant says she is happy with the results, and says that, given that she has one more year of school left, she wanted to utilize her presence at the college while she can.
“It’s a position that I’ve loved contributing to,” says Grant. “I’ve found a lot of passion in the work I’ve done with the student society as the role of external executive. I’m excited to be re-elected and contributing again in that way.”
Grant says there is always room for improvement in a non-profit student environment.
“We’re definitely working on continuing to do that good work,” she says.
Grant says that the passing of the Walk Safer referendum is important to student life and safety on campus.
“It was really great to see such an overwhelmingly positive response to additional Walk Safer funding,” she says, “which shows that students value the service.”
The use of online voting for the first time in a CCSS election may have been the reason for the high number of votes that were cast. Grant says that online voting is vital in today’s world in terms of accessibility to a voting platform for students.
“That was really exciting to see happen,” says Grant. “We definitely had a higher voter turnout than we’ve ever had, and that’s always really good to see; a lot more students had a chance to vote for who they want to see represent them.”
Grant is looking forward to continuing work in policy development for the student society.
“I’m excited to be working with a lot of new people on our board as well as several returning folks,” says Grant. “It’s a good mix of fresh faces and people who are wanting to continue. It looks like we have a really good team this year, and I’m excited to get to work.”
Grant says one of the key elements of her position is being present for the needs and interests of the students.
“All of the members of the board of directors work for the students, so if a student were to come to me, it’s my job to try and do my best to help accommodate what they’re looking to accomplish,” says Grant. “If they’re having issues, then I connect them to advocacy; if they want to fundraise for a particular cause, then I support that. I don’t really view it as a position of power as much as a position of empowerment and facilitating. I’m really excited to have the privilege of being able to do that again.”