On the final day of interviews, 355 students walked through the doors of the Reitz Union Grand Ballroom and interviewed with political parties in Student Government.
Erica Baker, the UF supervisor of elections, wrote in an email Tuesday afternoon that 61 students interviewed with Access Party and 289 students interviewed with Impact Party. Five students listed as independents or without party affiliation.
A total of 560 students interviewed with parties during the past three days, 460 with Impact and 100 with Access. Spring 2015 elections saw a record turnout of more than 800 students signing up for interviews.
Max Stein, 25, interviewed for a graduate seat with Access.
The UF second-year mechanical engineering graduate student said he used to be a senator for the College of Engineering, but after his one-year term, he decided to take a break from SG.
He said he came back to run for Senate to help represent graduate students.
“I’d really like to raise awareness about Student Government in general,” he said. “People should know where their money is going.”
Brendan Barany said he chose to interview for a sophomore seat with Impact because he believes in the goals of the party.
The 18-year-old UF finance freshman said a lot of his friends are involved with Impact.
“I know the caliber of people that they are, and those are the type of people that I would like to be around,” he said.
Blake Murphy, the campaign manager for Impact, said they saw exactly what they wanted.
“I’m excited to get the results of all of our work from the past three days and start to create our slate of candidates,” he said.
Praveen Varanasi, Access president, said he was proud of students who interviewed with Access.
“It was a good experience talking to (students), getting to know why they wanted to be a part of Student Government,” he said.
Contact Melissa Gomez at mgomez@alligator.org and follow her on Twitter @MelissaGomez004.
