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Kallaway representative may be ineligible

The ASUO president may have appointed a student to the Student Senate ineligible to vote in the race for his own seat, although nobody I’ve yet talked to seems to know with certainty whether that’s the case.

The student is ethnic studies major Xavier Aranda, whom everyone on the Senate seemed Wednesday night to agree was personally qualified for Senate Seat 14, the seat whose occupant represents students majoring in ethnic studies and 24 other linguistic and social studies disciplines.

Aranda, however, is also a Cal. State East Bay student attending the University of Oregon through the National Student Exchange. NSE students are represented by seat 19, which also represents journalism students. Former ASUO Elections Coordintor Aaron Tuttle said said NSE students “probably only vote for that seat.”

However, Tuttle was only guessing. The person likeliest to have answers, University tech support staffer Tim Ketchum, didn’t return my 3:30 p.m. phone call Wednesday.

Tuttle did say, though, that, if Aranda were in fact not eligible to vote for Seat 14, it he believed it would not make him ineligible to be appointed to it, because his is a mid-year appointment.

Aranda’s appointment was deferred in a narrow vote by the Senate on Wednesday night pending a ruling on whether he is eligible by the ASUO Constitution Court. His appointment was debated vigorously and at length by the Senate and he stood by and watched, becoming more and more downcast as he did.

Nevertheless, when I asked him afterward, he said that while he learned a lot about how the Senate works (and I believe as a Commentator contributor I’m obliged to view that as something dispiriting), he still wanted to be a senator. While I know nothing else about him other than what I’ve already said and what’s in this very interesting autobiographical capsule, I have to say I admire that kind of pluck (or moxy, as an OC editor emeritus is fond of putting it).

  1. Wow. I had intended to call you about this issue yesterday, but then I didn’t because I for some reason believed you were a history major and therefore would not have known whether you were eligible to vote for other seats because there was no election for Seat 14 last year. How wrong I was. Very interesting. Good to know you are doing well.

  2. Lyzi says:

    Yay Mikey! That’s exactly it.

  3. Mikey- Senate Seat #3:NSE says:

    I couldn’t help notice the recent article regarding the postponed Senate Appointment for Seat 14 and then this post and having memories from a year ago when I initially applied to be on Senate. I figured since the ASUO has been wrapped up in precedents and procedures since times dating before my own, I figured I would give a short re-cap of what my situation was last year.

    When I applied for a Senate position on the ASUO last year as a NSE participant I believe I applied for Two Seats. One of them was Senate Seat 20: Education and the other Senate Seat 11: Undeclared. As a student, I had no major “declared” at the University of Oregon, but, I was declared as an Education Major back at my other school, and being a student government junkie you can see where I began to formulate a debate. So I focused my efforts on Seat 11 for Undeclared and came to my interview ready to go. Long story short the decision was made that I wasn’t declared anything at University of Oregon even though I was studying “Education”I was not declared “Education” at the University of Oregon and since I was “declared” education I was definitely not “Undeclared” for University of Oregon. Interesting.

    Anyways, I just wanted to point out that as a former student/senator on National Student Exchange the major that comes up on the records in the Registrar office is “National Student Exchange”. In my humble opinion, it would be a clear violation of the Senate Rule 4.3.

    Also, I would like to point out that I do not recall who I was able to vote for. My instinct says I was not able to vote at all for any of the Academic Seats, which may open up a whole new can of debate on why they don’t get the chance to vote.

    In conclusion, isn’t there a polite way to side step this little political dance surrounding “Academic Seats” and appoint this poor and innocent Xavier cat to Senate Seat #1? Is that really how you want to invite these out-of-town folk to the table who want to help out your campus?

    Alive and Well in Wisconsin,

    Mikey Broetzmann

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