Jon Wu ’11 defeated Ryan Beauchamp ’10 to claim the Yale College Council presidency on Tuesday, winning 54.9 percent of the vote to Beauchamp’s 45.1 percent.
Wu, the YCC treasurer and a former Freshman Class Council chair and Saybrook College YCC representative, ran on a platform of continued advocacy for issues taken on by the YCC this year, including academic minors, financial aid reform and gender-neutral housing. He also pledged to reform the council’s internal workings, especially its record-keeping and its method of selecting students for University standing committees.
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“I’m just very excited about this election,” said Wu, who was en route to the Berkeley Bagel Bar to celebrate with his campaign team. “I’m so glad all our hard work paid off.”
Beauchamp, chair of the Junior Class Council and a member of Jonathan Edwards College, was the first YCC outsider to run for president in recent memory. Like Wu, he championed issues such as academic minors and gender-neutral housing. Beauchamp also suggested making more dining options available and using the newly created YCC Concert Committee to make Yale’s music scene more “vibrant.”
Reached by phone Tuesday night, Beauchamp expressed gratitude to his supporters. He also wished Wu luck as president.
Wu will succeed current YCC President Rich Tao ’10, who considered running for re-election before deciding against it earlier this month.
Timothy Dwight YCC Representative Abigail Cheung ’11 won the vice presidency with 52.7 percent of the vote over Silliman College YCC Representative Brian Levin ’11.
“I’m really excited for the new Executive Board,” Cheung said Tuesday night. “My wholehearted congratulations go out to Brian as well. He put up a great race, and it was really close.”
The race to succeed the president-elect as treasurer was too close to produce an outright winner. Colin Adamo ’10 and Adam Thomas ’12 will participate in a run-off election on Thursday between 9 a.m. and midnight.
Adamo took 40.6 percent of the vote, while Thomas earned 38.6 percent. Because no candidate won a majority and the two frontrunners are within five percentage points of one another, the YCC election committee’s rules dictate that a runoff must decide the winner. Yanni Legmpelos ’12 came in third with 20.8 percent of the vote.
Thomas said he is excited to keep the campaign “going strong,” though he declined to comment on the rumors that his opponent’s candidacy is a joke. Adamo — whose candidacy statement says he will help Yale “find treasure” and promises “an end to the profligate spending of our aristocrats on baubles and items of false sanctity from the many caravans of Sarmathian charlatans who infest our towns” — could not be reached for comment Tuesday night.
Legmpelos said he will not formally endorse either of his opponents, but he said he hopes Adamo wins.
“I’m excited to see what he does,” Legmpelos said.
Mike Bronfin ’11 will succeed outgoing YCC Secretary Jasper Wang ’10 after besting Rustin Fakheri ’12, Reese Faust ’10 and Victoria Gilcrease ’12. Bronfin won 50.8 percent of the vote, while Faust, Gilcrease and Fakheri earned 21.3, 14.8 and 13 percent, respectively.
“I’m really excited to work with this [Executive] Board,” Bronfin said. “I think it’s going to be a really great group.”
Silliman YSAC Representative Mathilde Williams ’11 will serve as the first-ever director of events, a position established by a YCC resolution one week ago to replace the position of chair of the Yale Student Activities Committee, which the YCC will absorb next year. She won 60.4 percent of the vote to defeat her only opponent, Calhoun College YSAC Representative and Spring Fling Co-Chair Natasha Sarin ’11.
True to her campaign slogan — “Yale is a party and I want to throw it!” — Williams said she was drinking champagne with friends to celebrate the win.
“I’m just ecstatic,” Williams said breathlessly.
Despite being abroad in China this semester, Erin Fackler ’11 will succeed Bryan Twarek ’10 as chair of the Undergraduate Organization Funding Committee, running a successful campaign against her sole opponent, Murong Yang ’12. Fackler received 67 percent of the vote.
“I’m really looking forward to next year and working closely with whomever the next treasurer may be,” Fackler said in an e-mail from China Tuesday night.
This year, 2,618 undergraduates voted in the election, compared with 2,757 voters in 2008 and 2,817 voters in 2007.