UPDATED TUESDAY, OCT. 19
After several days of delays, Shalhevet’s representative elections were finally held last Thursday at lunch, but various problems caused delays in the freshman and sophomore results.
The sophomore was reheld Monday, because in the original tally, more ballots had been cast than there are members of the class. Vote counting is scheduled for today, Wednesday, after school.
A high voter turnout last week was fueled by student interest in the proposed schedule change referendum (see related story). Students crowded around various separate tables in the foyer for freshman, sophomore and junior elections, and a separate one for the schedule election.
Juniors David Rokah and Shir Alkoby were elected to Agenda and their classmates Eitan Spitzer and Adam Ashkenazi to the Fairness Committee. Rachel Lester and Ariella Joffe were elected to SAC, the Student Activities Committee. Karen Tal, the grade’s only candidate for the dormant Constructive Consequences Committee (CCC), was elected by default.
But results for the ninth grade Agenda and Fairness representatives were delayed because Hannah-Leeba Ellenhorn was elected to both committees. Agenda faculty adviser Dr. Jill Beerman said that Hannah-Leeba would have to choose which committee to join.
“The winners of Agenda and Fairness for the freshmen will depend on which committee this candidate selects,” said Dr. Beerman. “The third place winner in the committee conceded by this candidate will become that committee’s second representative.”
Hannah-Leeba was not at school when the ballots were counted so the decision awaited her return.
Freshman Miriam Lelah had a similar situation winning spots on both SAC and CCC, and chose to join Rebecca Elyasi as ninth grade SAC representative. Melissa Ohana won for CCC unopposed.
Ballot confusion may have caused the problem for the sophomore class. At first, there were not enough on hand, so some voters made their own handwritten sheets, but then when when printed ones were made available later in the lunch period they thought they should vote a second time on the new ballots.students submitted handwritten ballots. In the end, there were 66 ballots cast but only 54 eligible voters. Some of the ballots submitted were handwritten while others were multiple choice.
Dr. Beerman said a re-vote would be necessary at a later date to give accurate and fair results. She also said that Fairness secretary, a position forfeited by last year’s sophomore David Shalom when he left Shalhevet this year, would also be included on the next ballot.
The results of the schedule referendum were a landslide for Daniel Schwartz’s schedule, which moves dismissal time up from 5 to 4:30 most days. (See related story.)
