Sustain Mizzou members gathered Wednesday over homemade vegan goods to elect a new president, vice president of programming and spokesperson.

Elections started with nominations for Sustain Mizzou president. After the ballots were counted, former secretary Kat Seal was elected to the position.

“I have passion for this organization throughout my whole body, and I would really love to be your president if you’d be cool with that,” Seal said during her nomination speech.

Seal said through her experience as secretary she learned a lot and realized part of being a leader is also about being a learner.

“I learned a lot about myself and a lot about the organization,” Seal said. “There’s still so much to learn.”

One of Seal’s main goals is to keep membership up, as it tends to dwindle down throughout the year.

“Mainly I want to give people something they feel connected to so they keep coming back,” Seal said.

She also wants to focus on community building and proposed the idea of having community potluck dinners every other Wednesday, opposite the meeting days, at the Sustainahouse. She said it would combine the social setting with the meeting component.

“We do a lot of awesome projects, but I want people to feel like we have a good community,” Seal said.

New Vice President of Programming Henry Hellmuth said he liked Seal’s idea of potluck dinners.

“I want to do more community building,” Hellmuth said. “It’s really fun and helps the group.”

Hellmuth was the former vice president of administration.

“Sustain Mizzou was the first group I got involved with on campus, and as a freshman I felt a real connection to it immediately,” Hellmuth said. “I wanted to make more of a commitment to Sustain Mizzou, and this job has a little more power and responsibility.”

Junior Julie Zender got the position of spokesperson for the organization.

“I’ve been in Sustain Mizzou for like forever, but just never felt comfortable running for a leadership position,” Zender said. “I didn’t think I had what it takes, but I have grown up and realized this is what I really care about.”

Zender said she would like to improve marketing and letting people know that Sustain Mizzou is an organization.

“I want to spread the word,” Zender said. “We have like a pretty good core group, but if we want to make changes in the environment we need to have a lot more people involved.”

Once Seal and Hellmuth were elected, their former, vacated positions had to be filled as well.

After four nomination speeches for secretary, senior Steve Pan was elected.

Pan said he has been involved with Sustain Mizzou for about a year.

“As secretary, I’d definitely make sure things run smoothly,” Pan said in his nomination speech. Pan is also a Maneater political columnist.

The final elected position was vice president of administration and junior Caitlin Swatek received the job.

Swatek said she has been involved in Sustain Mizzou since her freshman year.

Like Seal, she stressed the importance of keeping attendance high.

“Attendance drops as the year goes on,” Swatek said in her nomination speech. “I want to make it really organized and have a specific place and specific time and make sure everything is executed.”