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Student Body Elections at Kellogg

In the midst of recruiting madness, the Kellogg student body elections have quickly stumbled upon us. Two teams have emerged, both with different people, different ideas, different agendas, and different sets of friends. The question everyone must be wondering is, who is going to win? And what will that team do to stand out from the other?

As I walk down the stairs at Jacobs, you can see the two sets of teams at work in the atrium. One team brought in coffee, tea and hot chocolate all week, and they took students ideas by posting stick its on their shirts. And the other team was handing out candy while sweet-talking potential student voters in their plastic construction hats. Meanwhile, both teams are making new friends with classmates by the minute and telling them about their ideas for the school.

Within these groups, the students have already taken on different roles at Kellogg.  Each group has a student that’s running as a president and executive vice president, and each group also has a slate of six vice presidents that will help with technology, academics, careers, finance, and one or two other areas at Kellogg.

As time goes on it will be interesting to see how the groups take on activities to maximize their chances of winning.  And in my view, a couple more specific questions come to mind.  Will one group campaign long hours? Will one give away more food and candy than the other team? Will they host happy hours for classmates (come on now, this is Kellogg, you had to expect this suggestion!!) And will they make far-fetched promises that they may not be able to keep?

Likewise, there are also a few provocative questions that come to mind. First, why do people actually choose to run for a position at Kellogg? Are the students convinced that winning will be prestigious with classmates or with employers? Will it help them land a job next year, or will it help them in their longer-term political interests? Or was it just something they thought would be fun to do while on campus.

But perhaps more interesting than both sets of questions above is the question of what can one slate do that the other wouldn’t have been able to do? Can they actually make change at Kellogg, by improving the new Kellogg building, getting more employers on campus, and getting employers to hire more people for the summers? One recommendation a lot of people have is to eliminate the grading disclosure system. But despite the efforts, that hasn’t changed in years.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m all in favor of getting elected for positions. I consider the process an essential tool to help lead an organization to the next level. In fact, I personally thought about running and a pretty large number of classmates tell me they were shocked that I didn’t. Nonetheless, these questions still emerge during elections and they are some of the ideas that I’ve heard from classmates over the past few weeks.

But either way, everyone would agree that running for a position is a noble endeavor. Not only is it a way to help maintain Kellogg superior reputation but also to improve the reputation of Kellogg for the future. Good luck to both of the teams running. And stay tuned to hear how things turn out.

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