On Tuesday, April 8, Macalester College Student Government (MCSG) Election Procedures Commission (EPC) announced the results of its recent Executive Board election. During the 2025- 26 academic year, Willow Albano ’26 will serve as President, and Philomena Shuffelton-Sobe ’26 will serve as Vice President.
The student body also voted to elect Samantha Schafer ’26 as Academic Affairs Committee (AAC) Chair, Ainsley Meyer ’26 as Cabinet Chair, Liv Peterson ’27 as Student Organizations Committee (SOC) Chair, Chloe Xu ’28 as Communications and Engagement Committee (CEC) Chair, Kurian Jos ’26 as Program Board (PB) Chair and David Christenfeld ’27 as Financial Affairs Committee (FAC) Chair.
The election, which engaged 22.73 percent of Macalester’s student body through the 486 ballots cast, was contested for all positions but two: FAC Chair and PB Chair. Compared to last year’s Executive Board elections, when 33.3 percent of the student body cast ballots, this year had lower turnout and slightly wider margins of victory in the majority of races.
Albano, who currently serves as MCSG’s Belonging and Accessibility Liaison, won the race for President against FAC Chair Luke Evans ’26 by 102 votes. At the candidates forum on Thursday, April 3, Albano discussed goals of streamlining communication between the senior leadership team (SLT) and students, specifically through the Strategic Planning Committee (SPC). Evans focused more on bridging divides between students living on campus and off campus as well as amending MCSG’s bylaws to improve efficiency.
As the President of Moot Court and Cabinet Chair during the 2023-24 academic year, Albano highlighted their leadership experience in addressing divisions and differences in Moot Court settings and in their work with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).
“I think having a diverse amount of perspectives allows for people to contribute to an ever-evolving discussion, and we need that kind of discussion here on campus,” Albano said at the candidates forum.
Vice President-elect Shuffelton Sobe won at the greatest threshold of any contested candidate. The current Cabinet Chair received 78.6 percent of the vote in the election against Sean Maxfield ’26, who served as SOC chair during this fall semester.
In her campaign, Shuffelton Sobe emphasized a commitment to fostering a welcoming environment for first-year representatives. Because the Vice President’s role is more “internal, MCSG-facing,” Shuffelton-Sobe also hopes to use her role to support individual LB members in their projects and streamline their work. To achieve this, she hopes to implement a mentorship program to encourage incoming representatives to familiarize themselves with the committees they serve on.
“[Committee chairs are] responsible for understand how MCSG works, helping them if they have any issues or if they have a really great idea, and they just [feel like] ‘I’m not sure how to make it happen’— that’s kind of what that mentorship would look like,” Shuffelton-Sobe said.
Shuffelton-Sobe explained that her previous experience as Residential Life and Dining Liaison during the 2023-24 academic year and current responsibilities as Cabinet Chair already involve working around roadblocks. For Shuffelton- Sobe, working with departments on campus requires a balance between articulating students’ needs and acknowledging departmental resource constraints.
“[MCSG feels] like we’re really misunderstood by the student body,” Shuffelton-Sobe said. “One: we do a lot of important work, and two: we can’t do everything that the students are asking for. That doesn’t mean that we’re not asking departments about those. It means that we are asking them, and they’re saying ‘we don’t have the money,’ or ‘we can’t do that,’ or ‘we don’t have the resources’ …which is disappointing for us, just in the same way it’s disappointing for other students.”
Current Junior Class Representative Meyer received 54.5 percent of the vote in her race for Cabinet Chair against Health and Wellness Liaison Catherine Kane ’26. In her role as Cabinet Chair, Meyer hopes to expand awareness of the Cabinet’s work, including reminding students that they can request money from the Community Chest Fund for any projects or events they’d like to organize for campus.
“As next year’s Cabinet Chair, I want to help advertise all that Cabinet is able to help students with,” Meyer wrote in an email to The Mac Weekly.
“I’d like to host a MCSG get-to-know Liaisons event to ensure students know who they can reach out to with area specific issues.”
Beyond her capacity as Cabinet Chair, Meyer also hopes to support initiatives that aim to increase the financial accessibility of studying away.
Last week, SOC Chair Liv Peterson ’27 became the committee chair for this year and next. Peterson won her election against Sophomore Class Representative AnLian Krishnamurthy ’27 and Fiona Godsil ’27, who ran together on a split ticket. Following the announcement of Peterson’s win, previous SOC Chair Alec Chen ’26 resigned. During their weekly LB meeting on Thursday, April 10, the LB voted to appoint Peterson to SOC chair for the remainder of the semester.
During next academic year, Peterson hopes that her current work implementing the SOC Code to provide guidance in the process of chartering new student organizations will allow the SOC to work more closely with student organizations. Peterson’s goal of providing more transparency and collaborating with student organizations has been informed by her role attending FAC’s committee meetings as a liaison between SOC and FAC this year.
“I think that’s helped me get a better perspective on the broader affairs that a student org has to go through,” Peterson said. “And so [my goal is] bringing that understanding to orgs and being like a space where it feels a little less intimidating—because I know it definitely feels intimidating as an org to go to FAC and request money. So being a resource that feels a little less intimidating is something I’m looking forward to.”
Current First Year Representative and CEC Chair-elect Xu, the only rising sophomore on next year’s Executive Board, was elected with the narrowest margin of victory, winning 54.4 percent of the vote. Xu described herself as “shocked” when she opened the email announcing that she had defeated Junior Class Representative Marina Moberg ’26 in the election.
“[Moberg is] a great inspiration, and she’s also a junior,” Xu said. “I knew that going into this, and I was like ‘I would love to have this opportunity to be in the CEC, but if I lose, I won’t be upset, because I know that there will be someone who is just as capable if not more.’ So I’m really grateful for that opportunity to have been able to run against her.”
Xu plans on implementing a program where representatives from MCSG can introduce themselves and MCSG itself during first-year courses (FYC). Xu hopes that CEC can ensure student safety and privacy by establishing a system of screening MCSG’s social media posts for any identifying information of representatives and students alike. She also hopes to increase circulation of information regarding MCSG’s work.
“I want to make [updates about MCSG] something that people can see but not have to look for,” Xu said. “Because I completely understand that following MCSG can be a lot, and you’re not going to look for this unless you’re really involved in it. And I don’t blame anyone for that. When people say ‘oh, what does MCSG do?’ I want to change that perspective and say, ‘Oh, this is what MCSG did’ because it is really inspiring to see a lot of the change that is happening.
Fall Junior Class Representative Schafer defeated First-Year Representative Lina Solh ’28 for AAC chair. In the candidates forum, which Schafer attended virtually from Turkey, Schafer expressed a desire to improve the financial accessibility of study away and generally provide more support to students struggling with study away-related decisions. Schafer also highlighted plans to offer more opportunities to explore post-graduation plans.
Current FAC Chair Christenfeld won his second unopposed election for FAC chair of the semester. In The Mac Weekly’s coverage of MCSG’s first spring special election, Christenfeld discussed his goals of reforming the Budget Bonanza process. Similarly, in the candidates forum, Christenfeld highlighted plans to move funds around in order to increase the Operating Budget.
Jos won the unopposed election for PB Chair with 93.7 percent of the vote. At the candidates forum, Jos highlighted previous experience on PB for the past three years and plans to increase PB’s collaboration with both academic departments and student organizations. Jos did not respond to The Mac Weekly’s request for comment.
With the end of Executive Board elections, MCSG is now holding their fourth and final election of the semester for class representatives and Cabinet liaisons. EPC will email ballots to the student body on Friday, April 18, at 1 p.m., and ballots will close on Monday, April 21, at 1 p.m.
