AnaElda Ramos | Illustration Editor

From Nov. 12 to Nov. 14, WashU students will have the opportunity to vote to fill 12 Student Union Senate seats and 12 Treasury seats.

As a result of changes implemented in April 2023, students are now allowed to co-campaign in pairs or groups known as “slates.” Under this system, students do not have to vote for entire slates and can vote for candidates individually, but the system encourages students to vote for senators who run on a joint platform. In the last election cycle, three slates ran. All six senators in the first two slates won, while the candidates in the third slate did not secure any victories. Clearly, the strategy works, but is this a good thing?

This election, there is a three-person slate for Treasury and a 13-person slate for Senate and Treasury. The smaller slate has no campaign promises as of yet. The larger slate, called “Students for a Better SU” is composed of eight senators and five treasurers. Their campaign promises are to “fix WashU dining,” “secure the future of club funding,” and “pursue data-driven transparency.” Other than these very general goals, it is unclear why these students are running together and why voters should feel persuaded to vote for them as a group. The ambiguity of these groups and their goals raises the question of how slating is actually advantageous to students, rather than just advantageous to campaigns.

A slate as large as Students for a Better SU sets a bad precedent. If their campaign strategy proves successful, large groups will run for SU in the future. Ultimately, this could lead to a partisan SU, furthering their already present division.

This past year, SU has become increasingly divided and, according to some senators, even toxic.

In March 2024, the majority (15 to 5) of SU passed a resolution calling for the University to divest from and cut ties with Boeing. 200 students attended the meeting where senators voted, and many spoke in support or opposition to the resolution. In September, SU passed a resolution (11-7 with two abstentions) with 12 calls to action; this included calling for Chancellor Martin to resign, WUPD to disarm, and the University to divest from Boeing and to drop suspensions against students as a result of the pro-Palestine encampment in April. President Hussein Amuri vetoed the resolution, marking the first SU veto in recent history. Further pointing to the division in SU, in a later interview, Amuri said he vetoed the resolution because of the culture of “intimidation, bullying, and flat-out gaslighting” among members.

Clearly, SU is far from united. Unfortunately, the 13-person slate is likely to exacerbate this division.

This pre-established coalition will likely vote together on many resolutions. While this may streamline the policy-making process, all other SU members will immediately be ostracized. If all 13 candidates are voted in, they will automatically compose a majority of SU, able to vote in any resolutions or motions they please. This may decrease the time wasted on bureaucratic back and forth, but at the cost of healthy debate of the issues.

For most motions, this may not seem high stakes, but, in the past year, we’ve seen that SU votes on issues students care strongly about. Next semester, SU will need to take on big issues, including how to regenerate the money they need to fund clubs, as they are currently running out of it.

This group and future ones that run may not be outwardly partisan. However, when large groups run more frequently, explicit or implicit parties will start to form. Groups may organize themselves around their most important issues. 

When SU reintroduced slates in 2023, it marked their first use since 2014 when the slate system was banned. SU originally banned co-campaigning because it proved to be a “popularity contest” that favored incumbent members of SU who formed groups together. The current slate system is likely to face the same issues. People who cannot gather a group will be disincentivized to run and unlikely to win if they do.

In the spring 2023 election, there was a 6% increase in voter turnout, and the Election Commissioner mainly attributed this to slates. Co-campaigning may increase voter turnout, as it is easier for students to vote for a group rather than choosing individual candidates. However, there are better ways to improve turnout. SU could instead look to advertising the elections beyond email, such as putting up signs as groups do for events.

Slates undermine the benefit of increased voter turnout, which is to make SU more representative of the diverse student body. Voting for individual candidates based on their individual values and promises results in greater representation. Slating, by contrast, leads to students voting for interest-based groups, creating a homogenous SU.

Slates could increase the number of students from underrepresented groups on campus, as they can run together and create a strong campaign. At the same time, it could also be a disadvantage as it would be harder for underrepresented students to create a slate that compares in size to larger coalitions, often composed of majority groups on campus. If anything, students from marginalized communities may be forced to try to fold into these larger groups.

Slating also comes at the expense of more informed voting. Students, who are already unlikely to care about or want to research individual SU candidates, are likely to vote for all the candidates in a slate because it is easier. If someone knows one person who is running on a slate, they are more likely to vote for the rest of the slate by association. These votes will only be informed by a slate’s promises which, judging by Students for a Better SU, are largely uninformative.

This week, you will be able to vote for SU Senators and Treasurers. I strongly encourage you to research and vote for each candidate individually. SU, I encourage you to dismantle the slate system again. At the very least, there should be a maximum number of people who can run together. Currently, SU is divided and contentious. We need unity and representation, not a party system.