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Ovi Kabir and his party members celebrate their wins in SGA elections at Hanna’s Cafe on Thursday evening. Moses York / The Daily Beacon
Imagine UT wins presidential positions, most senate seats Staff Report The 2017-2018 SGA election season ended on Thursday with the Imagine campaign winning president, vice president, UT board of trustees representative and most senate seats. With 3,165 votes — 45.63 percent — of overall votes for SGA president, Ovi Kabir, junior in political science, became UT’s SGA president-elect and with 2,579 votes — 43.74 percent — of votes, Hailey Paige, junior in chemistry, became UT’s vice president-elect. Maddie Stephens, senior in English literature from the Together campaign, won student services director with 4,528 votes, and John Calvin Bryant, junior in food science and technology, won UT Board of Trustees representative. “I’m just so grateful. I was so nervous going into this,” Kabir said. “Five minutes before waiting there, trying to listen, you know, ‘What’s the numbers. What’s the numbers?’ But it wasn’t because of ‘Will I not be president?’ but ‘Will I let my team down?’ Just being able to come back and just say that we did it I’m so happy.” This year’s voter turnout was the secondhighest voter turnout in UT history, with 6,936 total voters compared to last year’s 6,616 —
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about a 4.83 percent increase. Dalton Teel, junior in agricultural communications from the Together campaign, finished second in the presidential race, with 2,371 votes, while Jack Larimer, junior in political science from the JAB campaign, finished in third place with 1,249 votes. In the vice presidential race, Xavier Greer, junior in accounting from Together, finished in second with 2,579 votes, while Avery Morgan, junior studying finance from JAB, finished in third with 1,211 votes. Blaine Ziegler, junior in microbiology from JAB, finished second in the student services director race with 2,093 votes. “Our main outcome, we wanted people to vote no matter who they were voting for, and they did, and we’re grateful for that,” Morgan said. “This was the second-highest voting turnout at UT. It was crazy high, and there’s something to be said with that.” Kabir said the first policy point he will focus on is the transformation from a dry campus to a damp campus. In five years through four steps, the policy plans to add areas of permitted alcohol consumption in Thompson Boling Arena, Neyland Stadium, licensed tailgate events in Circle Park, Fiji Island and upperclassman residence halls such as Laurel and Vol Hall. “Something that I want to push forward very quickly is that we promised that we have a five-
year plan for the damp campus policy on this campus,” Kabir said. “Of course, that’s going to take five years, but we’ve got to start working now to get that implemented.” Teel, although unsure of his plans for next year, said his campaign members will continue to promote the foundations of their campaign. “For Xavier, me, Maddie and Maya, it was never about the position. So I think we’re really going to have to remember that. We’re going to have to remember that it was about a passion that we had for making people feel important,” Teel said. “That might just be us sitting at a table in Starbucks in the library. We always have. And just making people feel like they are a part of something here.” Larimer, while disappointed with the results, said that he is looking forward to all the different ways that JAB can still make an impact on campus in other organizations. “I think that we said wherever we went that SGA needs to recognize that that’s not the only place where change happens. And I think that’s important to keep ahold of that whatever (regardless of what) organization we’re in, whether that’s CHEW (Center for Health Education and Wellness) or SAA (Student Alumni Association) or GLS (Global Leadership Scholars) or Avery’s Torchfund,” Larimer said. “We have so many opportunities to make Knoxville and UT a better
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place. That’s exciting.” Greer also said that he hopes the organization and university continue to improve. “I wish the next SGA the best of luck. I know we’ll still be around. We have a whole bunch of first-year students that are excited to continue. Even though we lost, (it) doesn’t mean that we’ll stop our efforts of making this university home to everybody,” Greer said. “I continue to urge people to stay involved. SGA is not just senate and student services. It’s what you do every day.” More than 40 Imagine campaign senators won their campaign. Although only two Imagine candidates lost, Kabir still feels that he let his campaign down. “I told my senators that if one of us loses, we all lose,” Kabir said. “I was disappointed in myself, honestly, that we weren’t able to win every seat. We lost two senator seats out of our 43. And that may not seem big, but to me, it’s big because those two senators, Joseph Staton and Autumn Ragland, they were out there every single day grinding, trying to get out votes. I was sad that I wasn’t able to get them there.” Kabir said he’ll go home to celebrate the evening with his parents, but after that, he wants to get to work with his cabinet and senators. See SGA on Page 2
Monday, April 16, 2018