Student Government Elections as Competitive and Entertaining as Ever
Memorable impressions of the twenty students who ran for office.
Last year, LCM’s annual Student Government (SGO) elections showed the highest voter turnout to date. This year, twenty undergraduate students—the highest number of candidates running in the history of the school—ran for office. (“It’s indicative of how highly engaged our students are in the school,” remarked Dean Moshe Sokol regarding the stats, “when ten percent of the student body wants to serve on student government.”)
Emceed by current LCM SGO president Nahum Twersky, the line-up of twenty two-minute speeches were reminiscent of comedy skits more than anything—though many of them managed to smoothly intertwine sharp wit and self-effacing humor with serious promises to initiate change.
Here are some memorable quotes and impressions from elections, streaming live from lunch hour:
Yehoshua Simon, Yehoshua Freund and Daniel Gabay exhibited heartfelt sincerity as they spoke of being generous with their time at LCM events, “fixing the little things,” and facilitating greater social interaction in the school, respectively. Kian Yaghoubnejad’s suggestion that talmidim should have shabbatons at rebbeim’s homes at least once a semester received appreciative nods of approval.
Noah Keifer managed to reference everything from Captain America to Ron Swanson to his hometown of Denver, Colorado without missing a beat. ) Others managed to promise rewards if they got elected—Gavriel Hashimi, for example, offered his voters a chance to pull his Chabad beard at least once if he got elected.
Meanwhile, Elie Scholl leveraged several famous government leaders’ quotes in describing his ability to listen to his constituents “so that it doesn’t lead to anarchy…or anything else that ends in ‘y’.” Yaakov Burack, whose fans cheered for him from the sidelines as he walked up to the podium, was honest as he said “I’m not going to make you any promises that I can’t keep” but…if there are any problems, he’d bring them to “the powers that be.” Micha’el Sher, hailing originally from South Africa, spoke in a similar vein: “Instead of just promising x, y, and zed, I’ll just walk into the deans’ offices. After all, it’s not what you know, it’s who you know,” he ended, over the laughter.
Simon Feder’s speech also drew applause. “I don’t have to tell you that your problems are my problems—your problems are already my problems! I already want them fixed!” Menachim Lansky was a bit more specific with the issues he’d address once elected: “If we have giant TVs around the room, why are they only being used for fire safety announcements?” Eliyahu Freund (whose last name is German for “friend,” if you were wondering) added to the list: “How many of you are still waiting for their pages to load on your computers, while getting error messages?” And Dovid “Go for the Gold” Gold sprinkled some yeshivish twang to his oratory. “I won’t just listen to what you say. L’cheorah—I mean, l’maaseh—I’ll follow up on it!”
Asi Kent’s creative speech listed off all the qualities that proved his future dedication to the treasury position, such as: “I can count,” and the fact that he once organized an amazing LCM event for free. “Who knows what I can do with a whole $30 from the Lander budget?”
Secretary-hopeful Tzvi Malks managed to elicit a wave of “awww”s as he mentioned that not only shouldn’t his marriage be a deterrent from winning, but it should work in his favor. “It means I have a lot of ahava, and as everyone knows, ahava is best demonstrated through giving!”
Joe Schwartz, who sounded like he had quite a fan club, said he hoped everyone at the elections enjoyed the munchkins; Jordan Mitchell asked people to forget that they know him and just vote for him based on the fact that they know he’ll do well; and Yaakov Parker somehow made parallels to King David, Shlomo and Yonatan; pachim ketanim; and the $250 technology fee all within the 2-minutes allotment.
The speeches for presidency were a bit more substantial. Mendy Eisenberg, currently an underclass representative, promised more transparency in SGO and highlighted the individual contributions he made to student government this past year (including hosting Minute to Win It, coordinating Purim’s Megillah Madness, and yes, adding the highly-appreciated soap dispensers under the paper towels in the cafeteria). Opposing candidate Eliezer Feder focused not on the ideas themselves but on their implementation, listing all the initiatives he pushed through with sheer persistence (to name a few: Beis medrash “do not disturb” signs, brand-new taleisim, computer science electives, barbeques, and that day’s pizza lunch, actually.)
And so, without further ado, the list of winners and Student Government committee for the 2015-2016 academic year:
Eliezer Feder, President
Mendy Eisenberg, Vice President
Tzvi Malks, Secretary
Asi Kent, Treasurer
Micha'el Sher, Upper Class Representative
Yehoshua Simon, Upper Class Representative
Daniel Gabay, Under Class Representative
Gavriel Hashimi, Under Class Representative
Noah Keifer, Under Class Representative
Yitz Gross, Beis Medrash Representative
