The Office of the Assemblies announced Keten Abebe ’27 as the 2025-2027 student-elected trustee on Friday. Abebe beat out five other candidates with a campaign focused on bridging the gap between Cornell students and the administration.
“Leading through listening and bringing students’ stories and perspectives to the administration is what creates change,” Abebe told The Sun in a prior interview.
The Board of Trustees consists of 64 members, two of whom are students holding two-year terms. Elections for student-elected trustees occur every year, alternating between the two positions — one is filled by an undergraduate, and one is filled by a graduate student.
This year, six candidates ran to be the next undergraduate student-elected trustee to replace incumbent J.P. Swenson ’25. In addition to Abebe, the candidates were Marco Martini ’27, Lani Lin-Kissick ’28, David Diao ’27, Reid Schwartz ’27 and Student Assembly Executive Vice President Christian Flournoy ’27.
The results were verified by the Chair of the Committee for Campus-Constituency-Elected Trustees after there were no challenges, according to an email sent from the Office of the Assemblies to The Sun. According to the voting results, 1,518 votes were cast, of which 1,505 were valid. The remaining 13 votes were empty and deemed invalid. The votes were decided by ranked-choice voting, meaning students could list multiple candidates in order of their preferences when filling out their ballots.
Abebe held the most votes in all five rounds of tallying, with each round recalculated to eliminate the least-popular candidate from the former round and transfer over their votes to voters’ next-ranked candidates. Schwartz was the runner-up with 447 votes compared to Abebe’s 623 in the fifth round of tallying.
In one of her campaign posts, Abebe shared how her passion for the student-elected trustee role stems from “experiences across the world that exposed [her] to a wide range of cultures, legal frameworks, and lived experiences.”
Abebe aims to bridge the gap between Cornell students and the administration, which she emphasized in her campaign introduction. She hopes to “shed light on those voices that might feel unheard” through monthly town-hall style meetings and one-on-one dialogues with students.
Throughout her campaign, Abebe also highlighted her commitment to easing financial burdens through comprehensive healthcare and financial aid packages, in addition to prioritizing students’ mental and physical well-being.
“Cornell is hard, and life is hard in general,” Abebe said during the election forum. “To have the space to navigate that while we’re understanding ourselves and our community is really, really important.”
In an interview with The Sun after results were announced, Abebe emphasized her goal to host town-hall style conversations with students in the fall to hear their thoughts on certain issues and see “how they would like to be represented.”
“A lot of my initiatives are very community-centered, because I think the best way you can serve the community [is] by, you know, integrating yourself into the community,” Abebe said. “If that means meeting face-to-face with students and bridging that gap between them more visibly, then that can definitely be one of the things I think about later in this very student-centered approach.”
Abebe expressed anticipation to begin her role and represent the community, prioritizing “making sure that students feel heard and represented, and leading through listening.”
“I'm really grateful, and I'm excited to represent students to my best possible capability,” Abebe told The Sun.
Reem Nasrallah is an assistant news editor for the 143rd Editorial Board and can be reached at rnasrallah@cornellsun.com.
