Vuur wins by a landslide, two new parties join the council

Six of the twelve seats allocated to student representatives on the University Council will go to members of the Vuur party. That's one seat more than the party already had, which makes it the largest student party on the council, by far. Rups and Student Coalition Utrecht, the two student parties that debuted this year, have won one seat each.

The seats obtained by the new parties and the gains made by Vuur come at the expense of PvdUS and VSP. The PvdUS has gone from five to three seats, while VSP has gone from two to one seat.

Voting
A total of 8,343 students voted for the University Council. Of these, 3,412 students voted for Vuur, compared to 2,806 students last year. PvdUS came second, with 2,008 votes. Last year, 2,345 students voted for them. Student Coalition Utrecht received 1,056 votes, while Rups was chosen by 800 students. VSP obtained 883 votes, compared to 983 last year. 0.5 percent of the votes were blank.

Three student members will join the council based on preferential votes. Biology student Nikki de Bruijn, from Vuur, received the most votes: 504 students voted for her. Psychology student Dewi van Onselen, from Vuur (479 votes), and Public Administration & Organisation Science student Lucas Meijer Galan, from Rups (470), will also join the council with preferential votes.

Staff representation
The election results for the staff section came as no surprise. There were twelve candidates for twelve seats, which means that the seats were automatically allocated. Nevertheless, 26 per cent of staff members cast their votes for the University Council (2,176 votes). 6.2 per cent of those votes were blank.

Lijst Vlam gained one seat. With ten of the twelve seats, the party is now the dominant force on the council. The Utrecht PhD Party (UPP) lost one seat, going to two seats. Finally, one seat went to an independent staff member from the Faculty of Medicine, although she has aligned herself with Vlam in terms of content.

Three staff members were elected to the council by preferential votes. Eleni Braat, from Humanities, topped the list with 546 votes. Bernadette van de Rijt from Social Sciences and Frank van der Salm from Rebo received almost the same number of votes: 349 and 348, respectively.

Voter turnout
The election turnout was higher than last year. This year, 23.6 percent of students voted in the University Council elections, compared to 18 percent last year. The turnout among staff members was 26 percent this year. A total of 10,519 people cast their votes last week. If you're interested in the turnout percentages for the faculty councils, please click here.