Students to cast Union Board votes

The election for next year's Union Board directors starts Tuesday, and some of the candidates have already proposed programs to improve the board.\nThe Union Board will hold an election forum at 7:30 p.m. tonight at the Market Place in the Indiana Memorial Union. \nOn Tuesday, the student body can vote online between 12:15 a.m. and 8 p.m., or from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. in the East Lounge of IMU. \nSixteen spots are available, and 29 people are running. An internal election will then decide the placement of each person elected.\nJunior Seth Zimmerman, the Union Board's assistant director of comedy and major attractions committees, said he is running because he wants to improve the concert lineups for next year.\nZimmerman said he knows students are stressed out with their studies, and naturally want some entertainment.\n"They want to see concerts that will make their friends at other schools jealous, and they want to see events that will make them say, 'god damn that was cool' when they leave," Zimmerman said.\nZimmerman also said the events must be reasonably priced for students.\nTo find out what students want, junior Ryan O'Connell said the Union Board should adopt online questionnaires and continue to use the printed questionnaires.\nGraduate student Dietrich Willke said he wants to create programs that represent everyone.\nWillke has a black mother and white father and has traveled to more than 60 countries, and also speaks five languages.\nMinority students compose 9.2 percent of the student body, and 8.45 percent of all IUB students are international students, according to the fall 2002 statistics from the Office of Academic Support and Diversity.\n"We could say to encourage people to step outside their 'boxes,'" Willke said. "I am always trying to expand my comfort zone to include things that I did not experience."\nUnion Board marketing director Scott Dittmer said two candidates are running for reelection, and many others have some prior experience with Union Board.\nAt the forum tonight, senior Kelli Kleindorfer, the current Union Board comedy director, said, candidates will speak about their platforms for a minute or two each, and afterwards voters can ask the candidates questions. \nStudents can choose to have the election results sent to them when voting. The result of the election will also appear on the Union Board Web site at www.ub.indiana.edu and on the Union Board office door in rm. 270 in the IMU.\nKleindorfer said the results will be available by Wednesday morning.