Political parties make a comeback

Political parties have formally returned to Grand Marshal Week after nine years. Political parties have existed in some capacity at Rensselaer for decades, though they were formally banned in 2017. However, in 2022 the explicit reference to the ban was removed from that year's election handbook even though the table of contents mentions them. Last year, the Common Party sprung up and endorsed Ria Massoni ’24, ’25G for Grand Marshal and Paul Khoury ’26 for Undergraduate President. Massoni lost her race; however, Khoury, who ran unopposed, won his race. So far, the Elections Commission has approved three political parties for GM Week 2025—The Student Party, the Party of Graduate Equity, and the Sunset Party.

The Student Party is led by GM candidate Chris Roe ’26. Its current members are John Poleway ’26, Kaitlin McConnon ’G, Ali Amrani ’G, Gideon Bauer ’26, Jack Gips ’26, Chris Stephenson ’27, and Austin Porter ’26. One of the party’s major policy objectives is to completely eliminate the Arch program. It is unlikely that Rensselaer would eliminate the controversial program as President Martin A. Schmidt ’81, and the administration as a whole, have affirmed support for it. In an interview with The Poly last year, Schmidt ruled out making the program optional for the foreseeable future. Should elimination not be possible, the party advocates for expanding Arch exemptions and allowing students to complete their Arch experience at any point during their time at RPI. According to Vice Provost Rob Hradsky, the Institute is already working on a similar system allowing students to complete their Arch summer semester during any summer semester.

The Student Party platform also calls on RPI to offer information sessions for students on their legal and “school-level” rights. This has become a significantly more hot button issue recently since the Trump administration’s deportation crackdown.

The Party of Graduate Equity, or POGE, is advocating for graduate students, who the party considers to be severely underrepresented in the Union. The party is led by GM candidate Tiburon Benavides ’27G. Its current members are Marie Shippert ’G, Jordan Krishnayah ’28, Joseph Killian ’G, Abhiyan Paudel ’G , Subhangshu Sen ’G, and Diyanko Bhowmik ’G. The party’s platform is critical of the Graduate Activity Fee, which it considers to be too high, believing graduate students are paying too much and receiving too little. Notably, POGE wants the Graduate Activity Fee to directly support “graduate-focused groups.”

POGE also wants the Union to keep track of how Master’s, Co-Term Master’s, and PhD students use Union resources and allocate funds accordingly. More specifically, they want the Union to differentiate the types of graduate students when budgeting. Additionally, the party wants to allocate subsidies based on participation rates, not enrollment.

POGE also wants the Union to fund amenities such as a laundry facility for off-campus students, dedicated graduate lounges in the Union, and additional childcare services.

Lastly, the Sunset Party advocates solely for the residents of Sunset Terrace, a road with several Greek life chapters. Their party chair is Greek Senator candidate Ibrahim Ali ’25 and their only other member is Jackson Lawrence ’26. The party’s six goals are making the IFC block party “great again” by having it run by students without admin involvement, greater independence from the Greek dean, letting Greek life students freely discuss alcohol, wanting chapter presidents to be treated as students first by administration, rebuilding the Greek community, and deference to chapters before IFC.

All of the party platforms can be found the in the EC discord server. The GM Week general election will be held on March 20.