History was made at this year’s Student Senate officer election.

Zack Odem was re-elected Senate president with 55 votes. For only the second time in Missouri Southern history, a Senate president ran for and won re-election.

“This has been the most amazing election we have had in the history of Missouri Southern,” said Doug Carnahan, dean of students.

Lisa Funderburk was the first Senate president to be re-elected serving a term from 1983-1985.

Another record breaker was the write-in candidacy of Andrew McGowan.

“This is the best write-in candidacy we have ever had at Southern,” Carnahan said.

McGowan tied for second place with Jacob Brower, each receiving 53 votes.

McGowan originally planned to run for president on the ballot. After talking to Odem, he decided not to run since Odem was going to actively pursue re-election. Once Odem decided not to actively run for the presidency, it was too late for McGowan to run on the ballot, so he decided to run as a write-in candidate.

“I really wanted to be president; I thought I had a lot to offer, but I didn’t want to jeopardize my friendship with Zack,” McGowan said.

Odem asked McGowan to serve as parliamentarian.

“It’s the best job in the world because you get to yell at people and don’t have to be elected to do it,” McGowan said.

“I decided to be on the ballot and see how it turned out,” Odem said. “If the students wanted me as their president again, I’d do it to the best of my ability. I was fine with turning the presidency over to someone else if that is what the students decided they wanted. But in the end, the students spoke and I was re-elected.”

“It’s frustrating to only lose by two points,” Brower said. “Zack is a proven leader, he had done an excellent job. Regardless, we will have good leadership next year.”

Stacey Allen was re-elected as secretary. She was unopposed.

“I wasn’t as nervous this year as I was last year,” she said. “But if I’d have run against someone it may have better shown that the students really wanted me in office.”

Allen is a senior elementary education major.

Mandy Witt was elected as treasurer with 133 votes. She too was unopposed.

“I thought I’d bring my experience as treasurer for other organizations to the Senate,” she said.

Witt is a junior accounting and business education major.

In other news: awards were presented at the Senate picnic for the officers as well as a new award for Senator of the Year, the brainchild of Casey Highland, senior senator.

There were four nominees for the award: Mandy Witt, Sarah Seibert, John Tipton and John Smith.

Tipton was the first recipient of the award.

“I didn’t even dream of it,” he said. “This is one of the greatest honors I have ever had. We had a good Senate this year because we did things. We had some controversy but without controversies, you’re not accomplishing anything.”