Thursday, April 22, 2004
Hey, I won! I won the election! I finally captured the SGA Treasurer position. Every candidate started campaign on Monday; lot of them made some cool posters, cool stickers, fancy signs, and even T-shirt. One of the candidates for SGA President Sam even spent more than $ 600 for his campaign. Although spending $600 for high election was kind of crazy to lot of people, he did got a tough opponent—Garrett, a basketball player, since we were the state champions; he was also a hero. And actually it’s hard for us to vote too. Both of them were smart, however one was willing to do the stuffs, but not willing to listen; and another one was willing to listen, but get so involve in basketball. Despite of I don’t like either one, but I felt bad for Sam since being SGA President was his high school dream, and even though he spent so much money, still can’t beat the popularity of Garrett.
Forget about those guys. Actually I got a tough opponent too. She was a cheerleader, which mean she knew a lot of non-IB students. I did try to have some good campaigns, such as promise a better Homecoming Dance, some good fundraising plans etc, but nothing I said could actually beat her cheerleading status. Two of my cousin even said I was going to lose. I would never willing to give up before I try. So, if I wanted to win, I had to use some strategies, which I absolutely hate. First thing I do was using the Faculty power. I sure didn’t have as much friends as she did, whereas many teachers were my friends. Some of them allow me to post my signs on their door or inside their classrooms; some of them kind of introduce me to their kids; and some of them even willing to wear stickers for me (I really need to say thank you to all of them). Second thing was using the IB power. Although 1/3 of the whole school is IB students, however, 99% of them were going to vote. This was a great advantage to me since my opponent wasn’t an IB student. I asked two candidates of 11th grade President to pull some IB votes from the 10 graders. Well, I was really lucky that both of them were really popular in 10 grade, plus one of my cousins was in 10 grade also, they pulled lot of vote for me. Third, it was the most things that I hated—sent out candies and stickers. However, it was the best way to propagandize and get vote, because lot of people just voted for the candies. And I even gave candies and stickers to those that I didn’t know. And I found that worked very well indeed. Forth one was a pretty important one, since I had a class with lot of 9 grade IB students and I got lot of supporters from chorus also. Last was a big part, and I really need to thank Jeremy, he made the best poster ever. It was really creative, and really nice. He also made some cool stickers for me. People just remembered my name by seeing those stickers and poster. And I also got lucky. One of the candidates for Senior Class President got some conflict with her, hence, all the votes from his supporters went to me. So, I won.
Am I happy? Yeah, but not quite also. One of my friends Ana was running for our class Secretary, and she was really nice, and intelligent. However, she got a tough opponent too, a yearbook editor Jade. And guess what that editor did? She brought all the good candies and chocolates and give each person whole bunch of them, and tell them, “vote for me”. Although Ana got all the IB votes, however the non-IB votes were twice as many as the IB votes. Maybe she was too nice to run against other IB student; if she takes my spot or another IB student’s spot, and run for the SGA or the Senior Class Treasurer, she probably would had won.
The most significant meaning of the election to me is a lesson of how to deal with different group of people. I think there’re some factors that led me to the victory: 1) Don’t run against the people is smarter and more popular than me, and don’t run against the people is as smart or as populate as me, either. 2) Be friend to the teachers always. 3) Make friends with different grade of people. 4) Don’t have to be popular, but make sure have no enemy. 5) Give people candies and stickers could pull lot of votes from the people don’t know you. 6) Fancy posters and stickers are important. 7) Be smart but don’t be arrogant. 8) Put more effort than your opponents did during the campaign days.