Question About ASUC Election Rules
Here is how our voting system is described on the ASUC Elections website:

The ASUC Election implements the “Single Transferrable Vote” system, also known as preferential proportional representation. In this type of election, you are able to rank candidates for each office. If there are six candidates for President, you may vote for all six by ranking them in order. For the Senate, you may vote for up to 20 candidates. Your first preference vote will receive a value of one. The quota for election is the smallest number of votes necessary to elect the required number of candidates (i.e. one for the executive offices, and 20 for the senate seats). This is calculated by using the equation (N/(S+1))+1 where N is the number of valid first preference votes and S is the total number of seats needed to be filled in the election. Fractional votes are dropped.

Can someone please tell me what that last sentence means? The other reason I posted this description of the rules is to highlight how complicated they are. I get the distinct impression that a vast majority of Berkeley students don't understand the election laws that pertain to voting, a smaller majority of students who actually vote don't understand them, and a minority of actual candidates don't know how the election system works. I'm not sure how bad I think that is. (Probably not that bad, all things considered).Email This Post!