Government of the Student Body executive candidates Henry Alliger and Chris Deal share a common thread.

Henry Alliger, GSB speaker of the senate, and Chris Deal, GSB director of academic affairs, both held the student council president position at Jefferson-Scranton High School in Jefferson.

Alliger is running for GSB president with running mate Sarah Walter.

Deal is running for vice president with presidential candidate Angela Groh.

Teresa Lawler, student council adviser at Jefferson-Scranton High School, said she worked with both students when they were presidents at the school. They led a council of about 25 to 45 students and represented a class of about 115 students, she said.

“They both have very unique leadership styles, and what I like is that they’ve both continued to develop them,” Lawler said.

Alliger was student council president in 2001 and Deal was president in 2003.

Both Alliger and Deal helped their student councils run the annual blood drive and food pantry collections Lawler said. She said the student councils were involved in about 130 activities each year.

“They understood how important it was to lead by example, and they’ve really developed that in college,” Lawler said.

Jefferson-Scranton High School Principal Karen Younie said the two former students were leaders who challenged themselves through classes and encouraged others to work along side them.

“Chris had great academics and was always a leader in the classroom,” Younie said.

“No matter what he did, he fell into leadership kind of roles.”

Younie said Alliger was active during his one year of student council, and he was also involved with 4-H and FFA.

“Even though it was outside of the school, it did involve students,” Younie said.

Sources from Jefferson-Scranton High School were reluctant to comment on which student had better leadership skills in high school.

Lawler said it is impressive what Alliger and Deal have done at Iowa State in terms of leadership.

Nathan Hertel, senior in political science and 2002 Jefferson-Scranton High School student council president, said he worked closely with both Alliger and Deal in high school and is impressed with their college accomplishments.

“Henry reminds me of [GSB President] Sophia Magill in terms of all the organizations he’s involved in,” Hertel said.

“In high school, he was the guy who was in every student organization and tried to be a leader in each.”

Hertel said Deal’s leadership strengths resided in his intelligence, integrity and knack for drawing groups together to get a job done.

“He was the kind of guy who could always bring people together,” Hertel said.

GSB Vice President Will Rock said he feels both candidates have ideal leadership skills.

But, he said delegating tasks among the cabinet is a common problem for incoming executives.

“It was hard for me to make the shift,” Rock said. “But honestly, every student leader I’ve worked with has had that problem.”

GSB elections end at 11:59 p.m. Tuesday.