Undergraduate Association Holds Elections
2025 and 2026 Class Council seats open, two referendums also on ballot
On March 18, voting for candidates for the MIT Undergraduate Association (UA) opened to the members of the undergraduate population. Voting will close this Friday, March. 22, at 5:00 p.m. In an email sent to undergraduates, Helen Wang ’24, Chair of the UA Election Commission, stated that as of 5:05 p.m. March. 20, 1612 students, or 35.23% of undergraduates, had cast ballots.
On the ballot this year includes the usual presidential, vice presidential, and class council candidates. At the time of this writing, four class council positions remain unfilled, namely, the 2025 secretary, 2025 social chair, 2026 treasurer, and 2026 social chair. Wang urged students to write-in potential students for those positions.
Two referendums are also on the ballot. The first referendum involves paying “student leaders/volunteers,” while the second referendum’s topic discusses a resolution “supporting a permanent ceasefire in Gaza, the cutting of ties between MIT and the Israeli military, and solidarity with pro-Palestine campus organizers.”
The first referendum’s purpose is to “align MIT with the vast majority of peer universities
in compensating student labor that directly benefits general campus life; incentivize the
continuation of on-campus student services and effective advocacy on student issues;
better hold students in leadership positions accountable to their respective duties; and
ensure students of all financial backgrounds are able to fully participate in serving the
MIT community.”
The UA council would be responsible in deciding which positions would be funded and how much they will receive per the UA Constitution. Positions already funded by alternative sources would be ineligible to receive compensation via the new referendum.
The distribution of these sums would be contingent on the Institute’s approval, and that students are expected to adhere to MIT policy. The referendum also states that “recipients do not necessarily have to be under the UA student government” to obtain funding, meaning that students in dormitory governments or Class Councils can still be paid.
The second referendum is titled: “Resolution supporting a permanent ceasefire in Gaza, the cutting of ties between MIT and the Israeli Military, and solidarity with pro-Palestine campus organizers.”
The referendum states that if ratified, the MIT Undergraduate Association would “join the
international call for an immediate and sustained ceasefire in Gaza and an end to the Israeli
military siege and blockade of the Gaza strip.”
The referendum states that the Institute “maintains a special research relationship with the Israeli Defense Forces through the direct research funding it receives from the Ministry of Defense of Israel,” and that the Institute should cut these ties to end “institutional complicity.”
The referendum claims that the “MIT administration has unjustly suspended the MIT Coalition Against Apartheid” back in Feb. 13, and that MIT “threatened several of its members with suspension for protesting.” As such, this referendum urges voters to “stand against” the decision to suspend the group.
For a referendum to be adopted, the UA’s Election Code states in Article VI that a matter must first be considered by a vote. A matter can be proposed by either six Council representatives or five percent of the undergraduate student body. For a vote result to be binding, a simple majority must hold with “at least twenty percent of the Association [having] voted.”
Voting for the election will close Friday, March. 22, at 5:00 p.m.