Below is information for students who have been nominated for an office in the 2010 GSG Officer Elections:

• Important Dates
• Accepting a Nomination
• Candidate Statement Formatting
• E-mail Address & Campaign Website
• "Meet the Candidates" Forum (Updated February 14, 2010)
• Other Information

GSG Officer Elections Homepage

• February 9 (Tuesday), 5 PM: Deadline for nominees to accept nominations and submit candidate statements
• February 17 (Wednesday), 6 PM: "Meet the Candidates" forum (Friend Center Auditorium [Room 101])
• March 1 (Monday), 5 PM: Polls open.
• March 8 (Monday), 5 PM: Polls close.
• March 9 (Tuesday): Preliminary vote counts are provided to the GSG Assembly and the candidates.

Note: All times are Eastern Standard Time.

You may accept a nomination by submitting a candidate statement to us via e-mail at gsgelect@princeton.edu. You can also accept a nomination by informing us of your acceptance without submitting a candidate statement. In case that you have been nominated for more than one position, please be aware that you can accept a nomination and run in the election for only ONE position. You also may not accept nominations conditionally.

The deadline to accept a nomination and submit a candidate statement is 5 PM EST on Tuesday, February 9. You may submit any number of revised candidate statements until the deadline. Should you submit several statements for the same office and not provide further instructions, it shall be presumed that only the last statement that you submitted is to be considered. Similarly, should you submit statements for multiple offices and not provide further instructions, it shall be presumed that only the last statement that you submitted is to be considered, and that you are implicitly declining your nominations to all other offices.

The final list of candidates will be approved by the GSG Assembly on February 10. After this, any withdrawals submitted to us by you shall take effect if not canceled by you within 24 hours from the time that you initiated contact with us to report your withdrawal (e.g., time and date that an e-mail was sent). If that period expires after the opening of the polls or after the committee deems it infeasible to change the ballot, then the request for withdrawal shall be ignored. Once in effect, withdrawals are final and the ballot shall be changed accordingly.

The Election Committee has established the following formatting guidelines for candidate statements:

• The statement should be limited to 2,000 characters (including spaces) in length.
• URLs in your statement will not be hyperlinked (but see below for more on URLs).
• You may use plain text and italics in your statement. You can indicate use of italics by using asterisks, for example:
  It was really, *really* important.
  will appear as:
  It was really, really important.
  Any other formatting will be ignored.

48 hours after the deadline for candidate statements, we will post your candidate statement to our website, and you will have an opportunity to look over your statement and let us know if there were any errors in transcribing. We will only correct errors that were our fault: you will not be allowed to modify your statement or correct typos. Please note that you will also be able to see other candidates' statements at this time.

You may wish to take into consideration that part of an introduction to the elections for potential voters will state "While Officers are expected to bring new ideas to the GSG, they are elected to serve the GSG Assembly, not to pursue a personal agenda.", and that details will be provided on the duties of each officer.

In addition to your candidate statement, you may at any time submit a preferred e-mail address and a campaign website URL. These will be listed and hyperlinked on the GSG Election Website alongside your candidate statement to allow interested voters to easily contact you or find out more information. By default, we will use your Princeton e-mail address and assume that you have no website. You may submit updates about either of these at any time up to the close of polls. The website will be updated within 24 hours of your submission.

A "meet the candidates" forum will be held on February 17, which will give candidates an opportunity to talk to graduate students about their ideas and goals for the GSG during the campaign. The forum will start at 6 PM. The Election Committee plans to videotape the event and post the video online for interested students to view.

Below is the basic schedule of the event:

1. Mixer, with pizza and refreshments. (6 PM - 6:20 PM)
• This mixer serves as an ice-breaker.
2. Formal statements and question & answer session. (6:20 PM - 7:40 PM)
• See below for details on how this part of the event will unfold.
3. Referendum presentation and debate. (7:40 PM - 8 PM)

The second part of the event will begin with an explanation of the rules. There will then be a session for each office, in the following order: Vice President, Communications Director, Secretary, President, Treasurer, and Social Chair. (This order was chosen so that the contested offices come first.)

Each session will use the following structure:

1. Randomization. The moderator assigns a random order to the candidates and calls them to the front.
2. Opening Statement. Each candidate has two minutes to speak.
3. Questions from Audience. Members of the audience ask questions to the candidates. Questions should be addressed to all candidates. Each candidate has one minute to answer each question. After all candidates have had a chance to answer a given question, each will be given the option of taking another thirty seconds to follow-up on his or her opponent's answer.
4. Closing Statement. Each candidate has one minute to speak.

If a candidate cannot attend the event, he or she may submit an opening and a closing statement to be read by the moderator. This statement must be submitted by e-mail to gsgelect@princeton.edu by 6 PM EST on February 16.

After each speaking opportunity, the first candidate in the speaking order will be moved to the end of the speaking order. The moderator will solicit up to three questions from the audience for each office.

The referendum presentation and debate will follow a structure similar to that above, with more time for the opening (four minutes) and closing (two minutes) statements of the "Vote YES" committee, and more questions (six) sollicited from the audience. The committee will have ninety seconds to answer each question.

Under unusual circumstances, the Election Committee reserves the right to modify these rules.

You are welcome to engage in as much or as little campaigning as you would like. Last year, many candidates posted fliers around the University and started groups on Facebook, a social networking site.

For the most part, you are welcome to write anything in your statements and you can campaign in any way that you would like. In extreme cases, such as threats of violence, the Election Committee may consult with the University General Counsel and take appropriate actions.

For more details on officer elections and the duties of each position, please refer to:
http://www.princeton.edu/~gsgelect/
You are welcome to contact us with any questions that you may have. You can also get in touch with any of the current GSG officers, who are listed at http://gsg.princeton.edu/main/Representatives.