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Students are set to vote in the Berkeley High School elections Wednesday, but a communications snafu is casting a shadow over the democratic process. 

Several students who submitted late applications are running as write-in candidates and must receive a two-thirds majority vote to win, though they were led to believe a deadline extension meant they would qualify for the ballot. 

Members of the Associated Student Body (ASB), composed of the schoolwide president, vice president, the student school board representative and a handful of other student officials, voted to allow students who missed an April 21 deadline to submit applications as late as May 5, but only as write-in candidates. 

The idea was to allow for a larger candidate pool, said ASB President Amy Yoshitsu, but Communication Arts and Sciences (CAS) English and communications teacher Phil Halpern fears that rule excludes some students, students who may not feel comfortable standing up for themselves. 

“My role is as an adult advocate for students who want involvement in the political process,” he said. “Power can feel exclusive and participation doesn’t come easily.” 

Now, he is incurring the wrath of student government representatives who say their autonomy to conduct student elections under attack. 

“[The teacher] does not have the authority to change the elections,” said student school board director Teal Miller, who is in charge of running elections. “It’s a student decision.” 

The ASB decision affects a handful of students (five to eight by Miller’s count), many who attend CAS, a small school within the comprehensive high school that does not enjoy the same student government representation as the larger school.  

Halpern has interacted very little with the students—they are all juniors, and he teaches ninth, 10th and 12th-graders—but he is slated to become co-lead teacher of CAS next year, and sees himself as a champion for kids at CAS. 

The students are running for spots on School Site Council, the Berkeley Schools Excellence Project (BSEP) Committee and the Berkeley Board of Education, seats generally considered more powerful than ASB or grade-level positions, because they deal with larger school and district policies. 

Olivia Cueva, a junior, is running for student school board director, but doesn’t foresee victory, because her odds of receiving a two-thirds majority vote as a write-in are slim. 

“I don’t think it’s fair to extend the deadline and then put us on a write-ins,” she said. “I really wanted to do this, because CAS isn’t represented in student leadership.” 

ASB members modeled the extension after general state elections, Miller said. 

Halpern wants to hold a meeting today (Friday) with all students involved, in a last ditch effort to get kids on the ballot, but it may be too late. The ballots were already drawn up, Miller said. 

“We welcome suggestions on how to run a better election. However, for this year, things are in place and we can’t make changes now,” she said. 

Mateo Aceves, a contender for student board director, whose name will appear on the ballot, contests the ASB decision, but on different grounds from his opponent Cueva. He thinks the deadline shouldn’t have been extended at all.  

“To me, the process seems like a sham,” he said. “If you guys want political legitimacy, you can’t just change the rules.”