When incoming ASUS President Jill Evans and Vice-President Josh Michelson need to pass the time, they dance—and that’s just what they did last night.
“I think we’re going to have to dance really hard to ‘A Little Less Conversation’ by Elvis. A remix if we’re feeling crazy,” Michelson said early in the evening as the team waited for results in Evans’s living room with a small group of supporters.
Evans and Michelson won with 1,547 votes—68 per cent of the vote. Team Sinkinson-Szczepanek lost with 716 votes, 32 per cent of the vote.
The team heard the news just after 2 a.m., shortly after incoming ASUS Senator Morgan Murphy got her own call in the same room.
Michelson said he and Evans plan to collaborate with Mantle and Vanier before they take office.
“I think we have to have a really good sit down with the current executive,” he said.
“My biggest question would be, ‘Where do you see this society going?’”
Another concern Evans and Michelson had during their campaign was the relationship between ASUS and the AMS. Evans said the team plans to build a relationship with the new team right away—starting with a visit to the incoming executives’ party.
“First thing—go and congratulate them and I think we want to get started immediately,” she said.
“We’ve spoken to both teams and both were really optimistic.”
The results of the AMS election had not been announced when Evans and Michelson received the news.
Michelson said he felt great about the campaign.
“We gave it our all,” he said. “When we’re in office we’re most looking forward to doing as much with the society as we can.”
For ASUS runners-up Dave Sinkinson and Dan Szczepanek, the focal issue of their platform—bringing back Homecoming—didn’t resonate with students.
When the results came in, just after 2:15 a.m., a dejected Sinkinson said he could have done a better job clarifying his platform.
“I thought we did a pretty good job of presenting [the issues], but I guess the Queen’s students in arts and science don’t agree with us,” Sinkinson said. “I mean, they voted for what they thought was right and there’s nothing we can do about it.”
Sinkinson said his campaign could have been more clearly communicated to voters.
“We tried all the class talks we could. We had posters up and everything like that,” he said. “I guess the one thing I really would have liked to do was from day one to clarify our message a little bit better, but otherwise I’m content with how we did it.”
The team ran on two pillars of representation and respect, which Sinkinson said he feels are still important issues.
“I hope that, at the very least, the other team realizes that the students of arts and science … have not been represented by the past few administrations, and that this is a great opportunity for them to build off our ideas. This is a great chance for them to make things better.”
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