This Thursday, 23rd of November, the student body of the Universitat de València will elect 75 student representatives for the University Senate for a term of two years. Alongside these elections, there will be elections for the different University Boards and most of the Student Council Branches (ADR). The polling stations will be open from 10am to 7pm on the 23rd.
The election of student representatives in the Senate calls on 47,374 UV students to cast their vote. The voter population is made up of 30,265 women and 17,109 men, with 80% undergraduate students, 13% Master’s students and 7% doctoral students. The student body can exercise their right to vote from 10am to 7pm on 23 November at the voter booth located in their faculty building or in the Doctorate School in the case of doctoral students.
The Senate is the highest representative body of the Universitat de València. It changes over completely every four years and every two years new student representatives are elected. Of the 75 student representatives, the number of elected members correlates to the number of students studying degrees in each faculty. A higher number of students within the faculty means a higher number of Senate representatives, meaning that the Faculty of Economics, followed by the Faculty of Law, the Faculty of Education, the Faculty of Language Studies, Translation and Communication, the Doctoral School and the Faculty of Psychology and Speech Therapy will have more student representatives, respectively.
Student campaigns kicked off last 14th of November. Since then, the 64 student candidates for the Senate have reached out to the student body through activities, such as classroom visits, informative booths, social media content, chats and debates.
Student participation
The Student Delegation of the Principal with the support of the SeDi Information and Promotion Service has launched a campaign to encourage the participation of the student body in the elections, both as candidates and as voters. Among other actions, an informational campaign was started, an informative session on presenting candidacy was held, grants were awarded to candidates for their campaigns, a debate was organised between the main candidates for the Senate and a “Guide to student representation at the UV” was published.
The debate was held on the 16th of November and was moderated by the delegate of the principal, Marcos Durà with representatives from SAÓ-UV, Bloc d’Estudiants Agermanats (BEA) and Unió d’Estudiants Valencians were in attendance. During the 45 minutes of debate, different topics were discussed that directly affect the student body, such as the improvement of infrastructures, scholarships and grants, sustainability and student representation in the different bodies of the University. The debate was live streamed by TAU (UV’s Audiovisual Workshop) and the recording is available on the Sedi webpage.
On the other hand, the Guide to student representation at the UV provides an overview of the University bodies that incorporate student participation, how they work and the election procedures. The novelty is that it puts the focus on the student body—the different ways in which students are integrated into the representative and governing bodies of the UV. The Guide is meant to be a useful tool for those who are approaching student representation for the first time, as well as a quick reference manual for those who already have knowledge or experience in student representation.
