After being Class of 2027 president for three years, Aiden Yu was elected as all-school president in the 2026-27 Student Council election after a week of campaigning and a day of voting. Junior Saanika Dutta will serve as all-school vice president.
In their campaigns, both Aiden and Saanika prioritized the goal of giving more power to Student Council and increasing their inclusion in faculty and administrative meetings to give voice to the student body.
“I want to bring more power to Student Council,” Aiden said in an interview with the Midway shortly after election results were announced. “I want to do that by meeting with faculty and the steering committee, and sitting in on some meetings so the students know more about what’s happening with the higher-ups, and so we’re not kept in the shadows about policies and so decisions aren’t made without our input.”
Aiden and Saanika have also proposed bills this past year to have at least one homework-free long weekend per semester and a bill to allow students to propose and possibly teach their own electives. These bills are currently being presented to department heads, but the student leaders expect pushback. New initiatives include a bill for one free lab period during co-curricular weeks, as well as a remedy that will allow U-High students to again eat lunch in the cafeteria at the UChicago Booth School of Business. They also hope to work to revise the cell phone policy to allow students to use their phones during free periods.
“Hopefully, if we can’t eat at Booth, we can at least have our phones during free periods. Starting small and then working our way up are our next steps,” Aiden said. “We want to try and talk to Ms. Campos because this year, we couldn’t make any changes because the cellphone policy was so new, but I think next year, Student Council and students will have more power and input into the bill in the future.”
Saanika emphasized how she wants to be an approachable vice president, and hold herself and others accountable for their promises.
“I think, in my heart, I’m just someone who genuinely wants to bring change to the school,” Saanika said. “If anyone has any ideas whatsoever for that, they should always approach me, but they should know that I’ll try to do my best to live up to everything I said I’d do.”
Other elected officials include Suna Choi Hortaçsu, Cultural Union president; Austen Wu, Cultural Union vice president; Austen Lok, treasurer and Mikey Skolarus, secretary. Zain Zaidi was appointed as a director of student technological service.
Class of 2027 officers include Bryce Poston, president; Ilana Schopin, vice president; Addison Brown and Liv Rodrigues, Cultural Union representatives.
In his statement to the Midway, Bryce emphasized that he wants to make school dances more enjoyable and create more seating options around the school.
Class of 2028 officers include Anik Jeffery, president; Shivan Sachdev, vice president; Kai Lichtenbaum and Anya Shi, Cultural Union representatives.
Class of 2029 officers include Kingston Zhao, president; Hazel Hotz, vice president; Julia Machado and Tanvir Singh, Cultural Union representatives.
The total voting turnout was 87% for this election cycle — 86% of 11th graders, 88% of 10th graders and 87% of ninth graders — up slightly from last year’s election.
