In the first round of spring Student Union elections last Friday, Victor Zhu '16 was elected as midyear senator and Teresa Fong '15 was elected to the Finance Board.

Zhu, who is the Student Union's second ever midyear senator, won with a total of 18 votes against five other candidates. His desire to become more active in the Brandeis community motivated him to run for the position. "I hope to host an event for midyears either on campus or even possibly off campus sometime during the year," said Zhu in an email to the Justice. He also looks forward to improving dining.

Out of the midyear class, 61 students voted in the election.
One student had informed Student Union Secretary Carlton Shakes '14 of having difficulty voting; the student was manually added to the voting group and made eligible to vote. "If any issue was brought to my attention about inability to vote, I am sure it would have been easily addressed like in this case," said Shakes in an interview with the Justice.

No other problems were evident. In an email to the student body, Shakes explained the differences between selecting abstain and skip when voting to avoid another mix-up like that in September and in other previous elections.

Participation in this election was down from last year. Whereas 71.8 percent of midyears voted in February 2012, only 60.4 percent of eligible midyears voted for the senator position this year. Though the voting pool for F-Board was larger, fewer people participated-12.67 percent of students this round as opposed to 20.72 percent in May 2012. However, more positions were up for election in May.

With a total of 148 votes, Fong became the F-Board's newest member, running against three other candidates.

"I know this position holds many insights into the ways of being a successful manager or businesswoman in the future," said Fong in an email to the Justice. "I picture myself in a corporation, running operations and supervising people," and she sees her membership on F-Board as beneficial for her future success.

As its newest addition, Fong hopes to improve the F-Board's reputation. "I know there are bad connotations around the F-Board and its members. I want to ... let people know that the F-Board members tries [sic] their best to be fair in allocating the amount of funds available." Fong is eager to learn more about the clubs on campus through her new role as well as network with other students.