Photo courtesy of Carl-Frederick Francois/The Beacon
Adrian Suarez Avila
News Director
The student body at the University’s Modesto A. Maidique Campus has re-elected Alexis Calatayud and Tiffany Roman Biffa as the president and vice president of the Student Government Association.
The last time that two running mates ran for re-election was in 2000.
Calatayud and Roman Biffa were chosen over their opponents, Stefan Bahad and Kristen Nyman, both members of the FIUnite party.
While Calatayud and Roman Biffa received 51.46 percent of the total votes, Bahad and Nyman received the remaining 48.54 percent.
Despite the fact that voting procedures took place on both March 31 and April 1 through electronic voting methods, electronic voting was not the only method available to cast votes.
Paper ballots were also submitted, a fact not reflected in the pie chart.
According to Michelle Castro, assistant director of Campus Life at the MMC and Student Government Association advisor, 25 paper ballots were submitted for Stefan Bahad and Kristen Nyman, and 26 for Calatayud and Roman Biffa.
Taking into account the paper ballots, the total amount of votes for Calatayud and Roman Biffa were 1,949, and 1,839 for Bahad and Nyman.
“I’m extremely grateful, extremely proud of our FIU student body for coming out as they did and [having] a record turnout [for this] election,” said Roman Biffa.
She added that she was excited to continue working for the University, and humbled to be able to continue on a second administration, considering that students trusted her and Calatayud enough to allow them a second term.
For Roman Biffa, she and her fellow members of SGA need to find new innovative ways to reach out to students and engage them, especially professional and graduate students, who she mentioned had no knowledge that she and Calatayud also represent their needs.
“I can’t believe it,” said Calatayud. “I’m so happy that I get to help people for another year, that I get to help make a difference in this university, that people saw that I wanted to do that and voted for me–that’s beautiful.”
Acknowledging the challenges of her next administration, Calatayud believes that self-expectations of improvement is a major one to face.
She admitted that this present administration could be considered a practice run, and that the next one will provide an opportunity to perfect what is currently being done.
Bahad and Nyman could not be reached by press time.
Although last year a total of 2,354 votes were administered by students for either Calatayud and Roman Biffa and Philip Koenig and Adriana McLamb, this year’s elections saw an increase in voter turnout.
This year 3,788 votes were made.
Despite the increase, the turnout is low, considering that the University boasts a population of over 54,000 students.
Calatayud and Roman Biffa admitted that this is a problem for SGA in general, considering the fact that since so much work within SGA is done behind the scenes, students don’t always know what’s taking place and don’t take an active role in trying to find out how to be involved.
Calatayud and Roman Biffa will commence their next administration in early May.
College of Arts & Sciences
Michelle Garcia
Charles Vallejo
Juan Duarte
Alexis “Alex” Cardenas
Chantae Brown
Engineering
Jorge Cisternas
Juan Narvaez
Graduate
Sahar Ajabshir
Andres Gonzalez
Business
Kristopher Alvarez
Weston Adwell
Marc Boulos
Nursing & Health Sciences
Dennis Par
Education
Cory Fairfield
Honors College
Danielle “Dani” Ruiz
Lower Division
Emily Corbin
Krista Schmidt
Jessica Brito
Kevin Markowski
Housing
Andrew Greshko
Talia Torbica
At Large
Alian Collazo
Lucia Scatamacchia
Christopher Martinez
adrian.suarezavila@fiusm.com
Dang that was close. Congrats to the candidates.