Nomination and Voting Processes

Both the nomination process and election voting are run through the same ballot system

Nominations: To nominate a colleague (or yourself), you must first identify that colleague’s GVSU username (email address without the @gvsu.edu). Once you login to the Ballot (with your GVSU username and password), type that faculty member’s GVSU username into the box associated with the particular committee/position and submit. While only one person can be nominated for a position at a time (only one username in a box), multiple committee nominations can be made at the same time (input usernames into multiple boxes—one per box--and submit).

Accepting a nomination: When you receive a nomination email (You've been nominated! - GVSU Ballot), click on the GVSU Ballot Tool link in the email. Before accepting the nomination, please add your unit abbreviation first to the textbox and follow that with an explanation of why you are running for the committee. Remember, with 500+ faculty members in CLAS, it is important to give people a reason why they should vote for you. CLAS elections involve approval voting where faculty are asked to vote for everyone they think can ‘do the job’ of the committee.

Voting: As mentioned above, CLAS elections involve approval voting. Faculty vote for everyone they think can ‘do the job’ of the committee. If there are 5 people running for 2 seats on a committee and all of them (based upon the text they uploaded about why they are accepting the nomination) appear capable of embracing the work of the committee, then you may vote for all 5. Once voting is open, click on the Ballot link and vote for the nominee by clicking on the box beside the nominee’s name. Please be sure you have the time to look at every committee as voting can take some time to go through the entire ballot.

Potential problems:

Incorrect username: If the GVSU username of the person you nominate is not correct, you will see an error message on the page you are sent to (it is not easy to see).

Multiple nominations for same committee: If someone has already accept or rejected a nomination, they will not receive an email from the system if nominated again.

Email link redo: Once you have used the email link to accept/reject a nomination, be sure to delete that email. If you happen to click on the same link a second time, it will take you back to the ballot and give you the choice of accepting or rejecting the nomination (the text you added will be visible in the textbox). If you reject (because you already accepted), the system remembers your most recent response (you will have rejected the nomination).

If you run into problems with nominations or voting, please contact the chair of CLAS Faculty Council Arthur Campbell.