BridgeToBU was announced as the 2025-2026 Student Government Executive Board at a Sunday night announcement dinner.
In the slate’s acceptance speech, President Matthew Feliciano thanked StuGov for bringing students together to vote and placing their trust in the organization.
This election cycle marked a new record of 6,784 votes.
Feliciano said BridgeToBU’s motivation to run was to bring students together and make them feel like they could get involved.
“We just always wanted students to feel like they had an opportunity to dream bigger at this campus,” Feliciano said.
Following the announcement, Feliciano said while the slate had primarily been focused on reaching election night, it is now thinking about actions to take in the future. Its immediate plans will focus on planning the Spring Festival and ensuring affinity center websites are fixed.
“The work starts now,” Feliciano said. “We get to celebrate tonight … but once we start scheduling meetings, we have a lot we want to accomplish.”
EmpowerBU’s presidential candidate Suraj Nellore said he was happy about the new record of voters and is excited to see what the winning slate does next year.
“I thought we ran a great campaign. BridgeToBU ran a fantastic campaign, but at the end of the day, we had different means to the same goal,” Nellore said.
Prior to the winner reveal, current StuGov President Akwasi Antwi gave an outgoing speech and said the incoming executive board should never look at themselves as being above a student.
“You work for the students,” Antwi said. “If they tell you to do something, if they tell you that they care about a specific issue, you represent them.”
Following the announcement, Antwi noted the work that lies ahead for the incoming executive board and reflected on his time in the role.
“There [were] a lot of challenges, a lot of stuff that I didn’t feel like I got done but a lot of students were made aware of Student Government, a lot of students were engaged with what we were doing … and honestly that means more to me,” Antwi said.
In his speech, Feliciano also thanked voters for participating in the election.
“We all had the same vision that BU could always do more, and that we weren’t going to wait for the administration to do it,” Feliciano said. “We’re going to take it into our own hands.”
