Last week 60% of students at Selwyn voted to reopen nominations for their JCR presidential elections. With RON ousting the other candidates, Selwyn college has been rocked by political turbulence. Another election finally crowned the new JCR president days later. But with the college eagerly watching Selfessions for more twists and turns in this undergraduate political drama, it’s rare that JCR elections can instigate such interest.

Despite falling turnout rates, the extraordinarily high RON rate said something very different about undergrad politics than perhaps expected: the electorate were paying attention.

The option to RON candidate’s is usually a sufficient protest vote, especially when options for candidates are limited or insufficient, but with Selwyn, the 106 RON votes show an engagement with student politics that the SU, student societies and other JCR’s should be jealous of.

Too often JCR elections pique only the interest of LinkedIn goblins hungry for more committee positions on their consultant in the making CV’s. The other typical candidates, well intentioned, but perhaps too idealistic do-gooders or baby student politicos, invoking some despotic populist call to overthrow the old regime.

Even with such a variety of candidates, JCR elections remain dull. Consistently low turnouts, positions going uncontested and little or no interaction at hustings define much of Cambridge’s undergraduate democratic experience. The ability to snooze one’s way to the top is too often a common occurrence.

But with the remarkable numbers in support of RON at the Selwyn elections- could this tide turn?

Students bemoan the lack of change in their colleges, at the university in general- but if the people with the role of representing us are bad, or even worse, fly under the radar in their mediocrity, then how do we expect anything to change?

Undergraduate elections should put forth the best candidates, but something is going wrong. Not just at JCR level, but with the SU too, these representative positions should be highly fought after with student’s invested in the outcome but many would struggle to even name or identify their JCR treasurer or an SU sabb.

Whilst students on Selwyn’s confessions page embrace the discussion over their recent election, it’s a far cry from the cobwebbed voting link many will receive via email the next time JCR elections come around.

Students should embrace the RON vote and use it wisely - to force their candidates and student democracy to be better.