Kristina Kim

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Sal Rao ’20 will be the next YCC president, after winning this week’s election with 961 votes, or 38.22 percent of the total.

Heidi Dong ’20, Rao’s running-mate, won the election for YCC vice president, claiming 1,386 votes, or 55.07 percent of the total. Rao will become the first female YCC president in nine years, and she and Dong will be the first female president–vice president team in a decade.

Caleigh Propes ’20, who ran uncontested, was elected events director.

About 43 percent of the total undergraduate student population — or 2,517 students — voted in this year’s elections, almost double last year’s voter turnout of 22.3 percent.  

“We’re incredibly excited to see how engaged people across campus were in this election,” said Nick Girard ’19, the outgoing YCC vice president. “Huge improvement in terms of how many voters were engaged and actually coming out to vote, compared to last year’s campaign. I think a lot of that has to do with the candidates running such great campaigns, trying to really engage campus. I think we did a lot of work on our end to try to push the information about how to vote out, so we’re really proud.”

Matt Guido ’19, outgoing YCC president, also attributed the increased voter turnout to the higher number of candidates running for officer positions — nine, compared to four last year — and the diversity of the candidate pool, saying that “a lot of different parts of campus were involved.”

Polls closed Friday at 9 p.m.

Aakshi Chaba | aakshi.chaba@yale.edu

AAKSHI CHABA