The results are in for U-High’s 2025-26 student council elections. After a weeklong campaign and a day of voting — which had to be re-sent to students at 9 a.m. due to an error in the digital ballots — the student body elected its new student government, with Daniel Chang as all-school president and Ty Quiles as all-school vice president.
“I think the role of Student Council is twofold,” Daniel Chang said. “One is to build a really strong school environment and school community and the other is to address the needs of a student, so I’m going to next year with both of those in mind as my two priorities.”
Daniel Chang also emphasized the importance of joy in school, and students feeling lucky to be there. He believes that the Student Council can play an important role in that.
“How do we make people excited to come to school?” he said. “How do we build connections between the students, and how do we incentivize students to come to, for example, homecoming and the homecoming soccer games?”
Ty, the all-school vice president, said he hopes that the Student Council can create a more unified and close-knit community within U-High.
“My hope for next year is unity for the school,” Ty said. “I want us to be more of a community, and I want us to work together more. I just want our community to know each other much better.”
Other all-school officers include Jonah Austen, secretary; Yusuf Arain, treasurer; Daniel Wu, Cultural Union president; Tyler Chang, Cultural Union vice president and Tinson Xu, DOSTS (appointed).
“I hope to bring some more unity across grades,” Daniel Wu said, “and have more all-school events that people can show up to.”
Several elected officials emphasized event planning and organization as a pillar of their mission for next year.
“I want dances to run more seamlessly,” Daniel Wu said. “I’ve seen how coat checking can get kind of messy, and it’s not my idea, but I do want to implement it, and move coat check into GPAH.”
The Class of 2026 officers include Elspeth LaCroix-Birdthistle, president; Vedika Dangi, vice president; Clara Blucher and Camila Bravo, Cultural Union representatives.
“One of my big hopes for next year is just to foster a closer community,” Clara said. “I think that all of us could really use that senior year, especially when everything with college applications is going to be so stressful. I want to leave behind more than memories, I want to leave an impact; I wanna make the Student Council a place where every single voice matters.”
The Class of 2027 officers include Aiden Yu, president; Saanika Dutta, vice president; Suna Choi-Hortaçsu and Austen Wu, Cultural Union representatives.
The Class of 2028 officers include Shivan Sachdev, president; Kai Lichtenbaum, vice president; Zeidan Rowe and Zain Zaidi, Cultural Union representatives.
“I hope to build on our success from this year by hosting more fun events and also trying to lead more bill discussions,” Kai said.
The total turnout was 83% voting for this election cycle: 84% of 11th graders, 77% of 10th graders and 88% of ninth graders.
