Long before a Joint Elections Committee member banged a spoon against a giant kitchen pot at 7 a.m. Friday morning, a crowd of election candidates and their friends were buzzing around Kogan Plaza, eager for the morning’s events to start.
The 7 a.m. start kicked off postering day, the official beginning of the campaigning period. The annual event is an opportunity for the candidates running for Student Association, Program Board and Marvin Center Governing Board to introduce themselves to the student body with a variety of logos. Putting up posters before the official start date is prohibited, and the day is often widely anticipated.
Dressed warmly and ready to brave the patches of ice and heaps of snow still piled along H Street, the campaigning parties lined up behind the yellow JEC tape that separated them from the future homes of their posters.
“Ten minutes,” someone shouted down the line. “Stretching time, people, stretching time!”
When the JEC gave the signal, the solid wall of supporters finally descended into sprinting chaos toward the Marvin Center, Academic Center and University Yard.
SA Freshman Senator Amanda Galonek said her strategy was to send her “strongest and fastest friends to attack the Marvin Center.”
“The two cross-country runners are going to the [Academic Center],” she said. Galonek, who is vying for a Columbian College senate seat, taped four of her posters together to form a sheet and taped the backs of them ahead of time.
Although the prime spots on the Marvin Center building were claimed within minutes, many students stayed for more than half an hour afterward, taping and re-taping to make sure their handiwork was secure. By the time they were done, the building’s brick fa?ade had been overtaken by bright colors.
SA Sen. Dylan Pyne, running for reelection in CCAS, was there with one crucial thing missing – his posters. Due to a “postering mishap,” he was armed only with “rudimentary placeholders” – several pieces of white paper handwritten with his name – that he will swap for real ones over the weekend.
A few steps away, freshman Min Kyu Kim had his foot on top of a handrail, boosting himself above the surrounding posters to hang one of his own for the position of Elliott School senator.
Kim, who brought five helpers with him, called his first postering day “very interesting.”
Presidential candidate Xochitl Sanchez estimated that she had close to 40 people helping her out – the largest group, by far. She opted to stand back on the sidewalk and check her posters – some with her portrait, and some with other students – and make sure her supporters followed the JEC’s regulations.
“My posters signify what I’m about,” Sanchez said. “They have a couple different people on them because it’s good to represent the University.”
After most of the excitement had subsided, JEC Vice Chair Tom Luley said, “No one died, and we haven’t had any fights or populist rebellion.”
By 7:30 a.m., Rob Maxim’s black EVP posters largely dominated the brick wall beneath the H Street terrace, and stood out against the other colorful ones around them. Fellow EVP candidate Jon Binetti could not contain his excitement over the “real estate” he scored at the top of the Marvin Center steps.
“If postering is Monopoly, [I’m] sitting on Boardwalk right now,” Binetti wrote on his Twitter page.
Logan Dobson, another EVP candidate, shared his strategy as he taped a poster to one of the last remaining spots leading into J Street.
“You have to be smart, it’s not about being fast,” Dobson said.
The election will be held next Wednesday and Thursday, Feb. 24 and 25.
