By Kevin Ritchie
As soon as the results of the executive election were announced, a group of five women immediately pounced on RyeSAC’s v.p. education Odelia Bay, jumping up and down and screaming manically.
Bay had just been named RyeSAC’s president for the 2001-02 term and, as the tallies were announced by chief returning officer Allan Craigie in Oakham House’s Thomas Lounge on Feb. 8, the elation was too much for her and her friends to contain.
Bay, a journalism student, nabbed 676 votes, beating out theatre student Rob Haines, who garnered 489 votes, and Scoop W. Gerbil (a.k.a. Norm Pinder) who got 139 votes. Gerbil was disqualified because he failed to hand in a campaign expense report when the polls closed.
Once Bay broke free from the melee, she took a sip of her water and lime and caught her breath. She had lost her voice earlier that day, making it difficult to talk, much less scream.
“It’s so much work and pressure and uncertainty,” Bay said. “I stuck to a message about work and ideas and direction and I never diverted from that.”
Bay said she’s looking forward to fighting to improve the quality of education at Ryerson. But for now, she’s just relieved the hard-fought campaign is over.
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