Despite their defeat, team SDL said they’re proud of the way they ran their campaign and confident in the way they came across to students.

Before the results were announced, presidential candidate Sacha Gudmundsson, ArtSci ’11, was not a fan of the atmosphere in the room.

“Everyone’s stressed, I’ve got to make the spirits come up in this room,” she said.

After news came of their defeat, Gudmundsson thanked all the supporters in the house and encouraged them to remain involved in the AMS.

“We ran the campaign with integrity, honesty and positive spirit. I wouldn’t change the way this was done,” Gudmundsson said. “We still put a lot of good ideas on the table, and I’m excited to see what happens next year.”

Vice-presidential (Operations) candidate Dan Szczepanek, ArtSci ’11, said that highlights of the campaign included class talks and the Golden Words interview.

“We’d fall asleep by midnight exhausted, and be up by seven with so much adrenaline,” he said. “I want CES to… involv[e]… [the] student population that isn’t normally involved. They should follow through with what they promised, this is what it’s about.”

All members of SDL are unsure of their plans for next year.

“I went into this with no backup. I don’t think I can go into a project like this without giving it 100 per cent,” vice-presidential (University Affairs) candidate Lara Therrien Boulos, ArtSci ’11, said. “I’m not fully closing the door to AMS. I really love the society and don’t think this will stop me from sticking around.”

Therrien Boulos said that volunteers made the campaign possible.

“We had amazing volunteers who had helped us run really a clean, smooth campaign,” she said. “There were moments we heard how the other team was campaigning and we remained positive and didn’t stoop to low levels.”

Victoria Harrison, ArtSci ’11, was at the party. She said that SDL remained true to themselves throughout the campaign.

“They remained positive and stayed true to what they believe in. In other years it’s been kind of obvious who should win, but this is a win-win,” she said, adding that team CES and team SDL had many similar ideas but different approaches.

While the voter turnout rate was low, Harrison said that every vote counts.

Therrien Boulos said she didn’t know what to expect the results to be.

“I expected students to vote for what they want. If this is what they want then this is what they should have, and I’m okay with that,” she said. “At this point we did everything we could. It hasn’t hit me yet that this is over, but we put all we had into it.”

Even though they won’t be executives in office next year, Therrien Boulos said she hopes SDL’s ideas stick around.

“I hope we’ve inspired people to think of AMS in a different way,” she said. “If you are here next year I hope you get involved. The AMS is a place you can find yourself and discover different opportunities.”

– With files from Lisa Acchione