Candidacy applications have been turned in, and come May 3rd and 4th, the student body of Skyline College will have their chance to pick who will hold positions in the next Fall and Spring semesters, according to Election Board members.

During the candidacy forum on April 27, candidates whose applications were approved by the Election Board had a chance to voice their reasons as to why they should be elected for the positions that they are running.

Currently, there are six people running for council holding possibly twenty-one seats, fifteen which are senatorial seats. However, most of the seats, except for commissioner of activities and commissioner of publicity, have candidates. Of the six running for office, only three were able to make it to the forum due to schedule problems.

However, many students were not present at the forum to here these candidates or the keynote speaker, Irene K. O’Connell, who is a current councilmember of the city of San Bruno.

At the moment, three students are running for president: Taylor Angel, Melchie Cabrigas, and Zachary M. Golden. Each candidate for president wants to bring change and awareness to the students, but all the candidates have their own way to bring change.

Taylor Angel has a concern for students not graduating on time. If elected, he said he would “implement programs by helping students finish on time.”

Melchie Cabrigas said that students are not that informed about the student government and she said, if elected, “I want to implement some kind of informational board on what is happening on ASSC.”

Zachary M. Golden mentioned how he has extensive experience in holding different forms of office. Since grade school, Golden took on positions from president to school representatives. If elected, Golden said, “I want to get more of the students involved. Right now, students are not involved, and if they do get involved, they would enjoy it [Skyline] more.”

With no contenders to their candidate positions, Peter Monrroy for vice president, Victoria Sorkina for Public Records, and Ben Gonzales for Finance do have goals for the future, if elected.

For example, Monrroy hopes to bring back activities used in the 2003-2004 school year like International Day, an event where the clubs sold foods from different cultures. Sorkina wants to see unification within the student population and Gonzales wants to show a greater presence of the student government to the student body.

When asked how the election process was going, Amory Cariadus, adviser of the ASSC, said, “I wish we had more candidates, and I hope people would be interested in the other positions.”

During the forum, Cariadus voiced concern because not many people were there to listen and mentioned that people should take part in the election because of its importance.

O’Connell said, “The local election is like the school elections because they both affect your everyday life.”

Describing the nation’s voter turnout, O’Connell said, “The voter turn-out is so small because some people are satisfied with how things are now that they won’t come out and vote and others just won’t vote and something will eventually happen: they will complain.”

As a councilwomen herself, O’Connell vibrantly said, “Running for office is an opportunity to go beyond.”

This year Skyline has six candidates out of twenty-one running for office. On voting day, students will choose who they want to vote for office. Cariadus said, “my mother told me that people who don’t vote are not allowed to complain.”