Technology comes to graduate association’s rescue
Election organizers employ e-mail, World Wide Web to make up for
skimpy budget
By Katherine Crosswhite
Do you know what GSA stands for? Great Stand-up Acts?
Generalized Syntactic Alignment? Georgetown Sewage Authority? No,
no, actually I’m told it stands for Graduate Students Association.
Of course, not too many people on campus know this – welcome to the
elite minority.
But if you really want to pursue little-known student government
trivia, allow me to let you in on another of the best-kept secrets
on campus: If you want to run for an office in the Graduate
Students Association, you have until 5 p.m. April 1 to turn in your
candidacy materials! How do I know this? Well, I managed to get
myself embroiled in running this year’s election. In fact, I am the
commissioner of elections for the association this year.
So please, tell your friends, tell you relatives, tell your dog,
if you want to run for office in the Graduate Students Association,
remember, you have until April 1 at 5 p.m. to turn in your
candidacy materials. (For the few of you who might be interested,
candidates have to turn in a declaration of candidacy and a
petition from 50 or more registered graduate/professional students;
elections actually begin April 15.)
The association has had a chronic problem with getting the word
out about our activities, especially when it comes to elections.
This year, we’re focusing on reversing that trend. You might be
wondering why we haven’t done this in the past. Well, the main
consideration is money. As a proud UCLA graduate or professional
student, I’m sure you’ll be horrified to learn that the funding
level for the association’s central office has remained unchanged
for 14 years!!
Yes, that’s right: The last increase in our funding level was in
1982. (There was an increase in the budget in the mid ’80s of 50
cents for every student in the association. But, this money came
with strings – the association must contribute the money to the UC
systemwide student government every year.) This year’s election
budget was originally $4,855. Some fast footwork on my part managed
to up this amount to just over $5,000. (How? We couldn’t find
anyone to run the Graduate Students Association newsletter until
one-third of the way through fall quarter. The vacancy saved us
about $300.)
Well, maybe in 1982, $5,000 was enough to run a luxuriant
election with scads of publicity, but not anymore. The cost of
printing ballots and either running polling stations (renting
ballot boxes, hiring poll workers) or distributing mail ballots
(plus return mail envelopes) almost completely exhausts the
elections budget, leaving very little for publicity.
In the past several years, the association has been in the
unenviable position of having to decide between running the
elections and advertising the elections. Result? Time and again,
voter turnout hovers right around 8 percent. (For those of you
keeping track, that equates to about 800 individual votes.) Why
this appalling budget crisis in student government? Why can’t we
get a little more economic wherewithal for the graduate
association? Well, you see, our budget only increases if the
students approve the increase in an election with at least a 10
percent voter turnout. As a college-educated individual, I’m sure
you’ve already spotted our catch-22.
So how are we able to afford publicity this year? Enter
technology to the rescue. Starting mid-April, many graduate and
professional students will receive e-mail ballots. Yes, due to the
much-appreciated assistance of the UCLA Registrar’s Office, e-mail
ballots and background information on the ballot items will
automatically be distributed to much of the Graduate Students
Association constituency. These ballots can be filled out and
e-mailed back, where they will be verified and processed by
computer.
You say you don’t use e-mail? You say your e-mail account is on
an obscure server that we might not know about? Try voting on our
World Wide Web voting station!! It won’t be available until April
15, but at that time you will be able to access it through the
Graduate Students Association homepage at
http://gsa.asucla.ucla.edu. (And you can already use the same
location to download information in rich text format (RTF) about
running for office!)
You say you’re a technophobe who won’t sit too close to the VCR,
much less use a computer? You’ll still be able to fill out a good
old paper ballot in the the association’s office. You say you still
think the process has problems? We’re open to suggestions!! Contact
the office at (310) 206-8512.
Of course, the development costs for this type of
technology-dependent election still aren’t cheap. I have to ask the
Graduate Students Association Forum to raid two other association
funds (newsletter and computer) to cover our predicted advertising
and photocopying expenses. And this, despite the fact that the
registrar’s office is partially subsidizing our ballot-processing
expenses.
What’s the point of my telling you all this? Well, I want you to
understand why I’m asking for your help – please, tell your
friends, tell you relatives, tell your dog: Graduate Students
Association elections start April 15; deadline for candidacy
materials is April 1 at 5 p.m.!
Crosswhite is a third-year graduate student in linguistics and
Graduate Students Association commissioner of elections and
appointments.Comments to [email protected]