Of the two slates running for the Government of the Student Body executive office – Ryan Crampton, junior in political science, and his running mate Jeff Edwards, senior in finance, and Daniel Fischer, senior in agricultural business, and running mate Maggie Luttrell, senior in history – it’s Fischer-Luttrell’s more diverse ticket and, ultimately, their experience that better qualify them for the job.

What we like about Fischer-Luttrell is central to their platform. They don’t have delusions of grandeur about GSB’s power, though they respect the influence it has as the voice of the student body. Certainly, as a male/female, greek/nongreek, fraternity house/residence hall, GSB executive committee/City Council representative, they do the yin-yang thing well, and have that mass appeal that may connect more students with GSB.

Finally, they have the appropriate experience and have already fostered relationships important to the job. As director of governmental relations, Fischer has experience in working with our state representatives. As ex-officio City Council liaison, Luttrell has developed relationships with key officials in the city of Ames. This experience translates into a much smaller learning curve for a position that doesn’t have enough time in the year to accomplish everything anyway.

Not that of all this comes without concerns. Fischer and Luttrell have been awfully happy to point out that they have a more diverse campaign than their opponents and much more and more relevant experience, but they aren’t always convincing when they say that it’s more than resume fluff. They have the potential to reach more students by having more things in common with more of them, sure. Doing the actual legwork, however, is up to them.

As for Crampton and Edwards, they wouldn’t make for a bad executive slate. They’ve thought out their campaign and what they want to do, and they can talk intelligently about it. They’ve brought a levity to their campaign that’s sometimes inappropriate, though it’s nice to see a pair balance the responsibility of the GSB campaign without taking themselves too seriously.

It’s their experience that’s the kicker – it’s mostly in the greek community and their respective colleges, as opposed to GSB functions or the ISU Ambassadors – as well as their mass appeal to the campus. Their campaign officers are nearly all greek, which leads us to believe that about 10 percent of the population will have an overwhelming majority of the say. Finally, their platform includes a fall semester kick-off concert, which isn’t realistic or as important as other things they could do.

GSB elections are March 10 and 11, and you can vote at www.vote.iastate.edu. We encourage you to become educated about each slate and vote – it’s through your vote that these positions get their influence, and it’s through their influence that they empower students. It’ll take you less than five minutes to vote – time well spent when you consider its impact.