De Anza Student Government elections are over — almost — and the results are out.
While voting closed on March 8, there is still no DASG Chair of Finance as none of the candidates reached 196 votes, or the 15% threshold of votes casted in the seven-way race. As a result, the election will go to a runoff with details announced soon.
Other than that, here are your DASG chairs; this is how the elections went, here’s what strategies worked and here’s what the winners campaigned on.
With former candidate Bryan Hernandez-Cruz dropping out — leaving Tony Yoo to run by himself — the votes mostly went to the two remaining campaigns, the Joe Maggard-Thomas Cheung ticket and the Luca Paliska-Aura Ozturk ticket. Palizka and Ozturk edged out Maggard and Cheung by 11 votes, crowning the two as DASG President and Vice President.
Maggard and Cheung campaigned on the De Anza Discord server while Paliska and Ozturk did not.
While none of the seven eligible candidates passed the 15% threshold (with candidate Jennifer Kava being disqualified after violating elections code), there was one clear popular candidate: Aditya Sharma garnered 143 votes, almost double any other eligible senator.
Sharma ran on a campaign of “increasing on-campus employment opportunities,” “optimizing budget request and deliberation processes,” “securing increased funding for student equity programs and services,” “expanding merit and need-based scholarships” and “advocating on a shared governance level for improved class scheduling.”
Though disqualified, Kava ran on a campaign of additional funding for clubs, accountability and accessibility.
Both Kava and Sharma campaigned on the De Anza Discord server’s elections channel.
Sharma’s contender in the runoff, Yan Ming Teng, received 75 votes in the general election. Teng campaigned on increased communication, transparency, awareness and efficiency.
Teng did not campaign on the De Anza Discord server.
Katia Bravo emerged as the Chair of Student Rights and Equity with 230 votes, almost 90 votes more than runner-up Arhaam Azari. Ryan Chu and Madhav Shukla, neck and neck with each other, landed in third and fourth place respectively.
Bravo ran on a campaign of marketing student safety reports to increase their use, creating a “more detailed guide for transferring students who have limited resources” and developing a series of anti-racism workshops not dissimilar to the Fremont Union High School District’s advisories from the 2020-21 school year.
Both Chu and Shukla campaigned in the De Anza Discord server while Bravo and Azari did not.
Veronica Hon emerged as the new Chair of Marketing with her campaign on community, inclusivity, “quick and dependable information” and “dynamic marketing initiatives.” Hon garnered 84 more votes than her runner up, Victor Pham.
Hon, Pham and third place candidate Javin Ku all campaigned on the De Anza Discord server. Interestingly, Hon did not list her campaign’s goals on her Discord campaign, only her qualifications and experience — so did Ku.
With the disqualification of Cecilia Ji’s candidacy as well as Maayan Pendler’s withdrawal, Phoebe Wang won the two-candidate race against Amin Mobedi in a landslide with a 228-vote lead, boasting the second-largest vote total and lead this year.
Wang campaigned for students to “engage deeper,” “innovate purposefully” and “empower impact” and branded herself as “a listener, a thinker and an advocate.”
Of the four initial candidates, Wang was the only candidate for Chair of Programs to campaign on the De Anza Discord server.
Michi Ozaki won the race for the Chair of Environmental Sustainability over Amadeusz Sanchez with a 104-vote lead; Ozaki’s campaign emphasized his personal experience, “leadership and problem solving skills” and “people’s awareness of environmental sustainability,” whereas Sanchez’s campaign focused on action items including “expanding cleaning efforts,” “(reorganizing) recycling efforts” and getting “this new committee rolling.”
Sanchez campaigned on the De Anza Discord server while Ozaki did not.
Jin Huang beat out Wadi Lei by 71 votes to become DASG’s Chair of Inter-Club Council, the tightest lead in a two-person race this year.
Huang’s campaign mainly focused on using “cutting-edge tech tools to revolutionize how clubs interact” and “ensuring every student feels connected and empowered,” while Lei campaigned on student advocacy, support and engagement for new clubs as well as students joining existing ones.
Lei campaigned on the De Anza Discord server while Huang did not. Lei’s campaign message on Discord did not include her goals, experience or qualifications.
Iris Li beat Kaung Lett Yhonne for the Student Trustee seat on the Foothill-De Anza Board of Trustees by 257 votes, the largest lead in the race, and amassed a 381-vote total, the largest of any candidate in the race.
Li went with a broad platform to “increasing the efficiency of De Anza-Foothill VTA transportation,” restore the De Anza Promise (which, while not gone, has been severely cut), “increase general funding” and “work on transfer agreements with UCs.” Yhone, on the other hand, focused his campaign to highlight international students and their needs as well as support from the DASG budget.
Neither candidate campaigned on the De Anza Discord server.
