Correction: A change was made to better reflect the percentage of people who participated in last year’s ASB elections.
Colorful campaign posters hung up on every major bulletin board and wall throughout LBCC means one thing, the 2019-2020 Associated Student Body general elections, which will start on April 23.
ASB is a form of student government here at LBCC, whose members are known to join with the hopes of learning leadership skills that will help them in their future endeavors.
The student run organization is delegated to represent the student body, and plays a key role in the disbursement funds amongst the different programs and clubs that LBCC offers.
“Every program that ASB supports is very important, from athletics to the arts. I don’t want one program to be left out,” Jan Paolo Canteras said, the ASB 2018-2019 president.
Candidates will have to meet the minimum requirements of being enrolled at LBCC for at least one year, completing six academic credit units, and maintaining at least a 2.5 GPA, this year’s election will have five candidates.
Alyssa Jones and Ian Rubinstein will go head to head for the ASB presidential position.
However, with no one to run against them, Kindyl Tisby, running for LAC vice president, Donnell Jones, running for student trustee, and Cesar Fierro, running for secretary, will automatically be appointed to their desired positions.
Despite the college having over 24,000 students enrolled, just over 1% of the student body actually voted during the last ASB elections.
Canteras won the 2018-2019 elections with 293 votes.
Canteras has acknowledged that voter turnout has been very low and set up a game plan to increase the student-voter turnout.
One plan was to market the election early on and to bring student awareness by putting up posters all throughout campus, and teaming up with the school’s communication department to email out important election dates to the student body.
“I am busy with work and school so I don’t have time to run for student office here, not to say that I don’t care about Long Beach City College, but a university is way more important. If I ran there, I would have more opportunities,” said Mayura Kong, full-time student.
More students shared similar ideals.
“If I didn’t sit in front of the E building today, I would not know there was an election,” said Brian Lopez, Pre-Bio major.
“The posters don’t do anything, people just walk past without even reading, they should make voting mandatory, then there would be a good turnout.”
“I don’t think emails would help, I rather the candidates be more around and in the mix, maybe not come to class, but make themselves more known,” said Daisy Salazar, who is currently taking general education courses.
“If I were to vote, I have no idea who I’m voting for. I think we should see a video of the candidates so that way we can see their personality, how much they really care.”
Canteras spoke about implementing a new policy for candidates to run for presidency.
With Canteras new policy, candidates running for president would need to have 500 signatures from their constituents.
Canteras believes this will increase student interaction and get them involved in the election.
“The ideal candidate is all about learning and investing in students. You have to talk to your constituents and represent them on all levels” said Canteras.
ASB held a candidate meet and greet where candidates would give speeches and introduce themselves to the student body.
But out of the 15 students that showed up, a majority of them were close friends and family to the candidates.
Along with the rest of the student body, by the time the event started, presidential candidate Rubinstein, was also not present.
Cantreras advises that the new president should stay organized and never do anything half-hearted.
Posters were displayed the day before the election around campus, and will give students information on where and how to vote.
Voting closes on April 25 at 10 p.m., to cast your vote, visit http://asbelections.lbcc.edu/?eID=1.