Despite the notoriously poor turnout in Michigan Student Assembly fall elections, MSA members say they expect increased voter turnout in this fall’s election, which began last night at midnight.

Last fall, 9.6 percent of the student voting population took part in MSA elections, while only 5.3 percent took part in the 2007 fall elections.

Election Director Emily Winter said she expects higher voter turnout because of the competitive nature of the election and quality of representatives this semester.

“We have really competitive elections this year, and some really great candidates,” she said. “And the candidates have been campaigning really hard this year and getting out their messages.”

This year, the MSA Election Board collaborated with Information Technology Central Services to put a link to the voting website — vote.umich.edu — on the desktop of each ITCS computer, something the Election Board has been working to get for the past several semesters.

Winter said she thinks putting the link on each desktop will increase voter turnout because “it’s a really easy way for people to vote.”

As in past years, Winter will also send a campus-wide e-mail today to remind students to vote. Additionally, individual candidates and representatives will campaign and distribute flyers in the Diag.

The Election Board also purchased Facebook ads reminding students to vote.

The election was originally scheduled for Nov. 18 and 19, but was rescheduled to today and tomorrow because of a timing violation with the MSA Compiled Code. MSA members say the new dates, which fall immediately after the Thanksgiving break, are not optimal because candidates didn’t have as much time to campaign immediately before the elections.

MSA President Abhishek Mahanti said the Thanksgiving break might be “problematic,” but that if candidates work hard to campaign during the election, voter turnout will not be affected.

“I think candidates will have a tough time mobilizing a lot of people,” Mahanti said. “But if they do a good job e-mailing and have a strong presence physically, we might actually see it be OK.”

There will be 14 schools holding elections for 36 open seats, including seven open Rackham seats, four open Engineering seats and 11 open LSA seats.

There are 13 Michigan Vision Party candidates, 10 Defend Affirmative Action Party candidates and 16 independent candidates.

The polls opened at midnight and will close tomorrow night at 11:59 p.m. Students can vote for candidates in their own colleges online at vote.umich.edu.