After seeing student council election campaigns become eccentric and expensive, Student Association and administration sought to revise the rules. Instead of the usual sweet treats that students have grown accustomed to during election week, candidates are only allowed to pass out buttons.

“In the beginning of the year with the freshman elections, Student Association noticed that people were spending crazy amounts of money on food and things to pass out. We didn’t think that this made it entirely fair,” Olivia Randazzo, committee head for election rule changes, said. “Also, with the new health and food regulations it would have been difficult to monitor what people were passing out and on which days they were doing it. At South they are only allowed to pass out buttons so we decided to switch to their way of operation.”

Student Association wanted candidates to still have room for creativity and to be able to promote themselves, but felt that the current methods had gotten out of hand. The new changes were implemented for the most recent elections that took place the last week of April.

As a junior, Randazzo was allowed to campaign with candy and sweets before this election, and did notice a change in the way she approached this one.

“In previous years I passed out candy because that’s what everybody did to campaign,” Randazzo said. “But with the new rules you really had to put effort into your posters and actually go up to people and talk to them about why they should vote for you which is what I did mostly.”

Another driving force for these new amendments was the unfair advantage passing out sweets could give to candidates. Administration and Student Association did not want someone to have a disadvantage because they could not afford to spend a lot of money on treats to hand out.

“Election of candidates should be about the issues and the candidate’s ability to represent the interests of the student body,” Student Association adviser Jonathan Byrne said via email. “When voting is influenced by something that is bought for the voters, then the person with the deepest pockets usually wins. This creates an uneven playing field for the candidates.”

With the rules in place for the first time, they proved to be effective. Randazzo noted that everybody complied with the rules and though some were upset they could not pass out candy, things went smoothly.