A scheduling conflict with TopNet has pushed back Student Government Association elections to April 5-6 instead of Tuesday and Wednesday of this week.

SGA President Colton Jessie said that when he called Information Technology on Friday, IT didn’t have the original dates available for SGA to hold elections. He said next week was the only time IT had available.

“A one-week delay isn’t the end of the world, but it is frustrating, especially for the candidates,” Jessie said.

The candidates running for offices now have the opportunity to campaign for an extra week, which executive vice presidential candidate Katie Stillwell said will help her out tremendously.

“I did not have the opportunity to campaign as much as I would have liked last week,” Stillwell said. “I had contacted a few groups to campaign, and a lot said they would not be meeting last week, so now I will get to follow up with them and hopefully speak to those groups.”

Presidential candidate Billy Stephens said he did not go to as many groups as he wanted to because of his involvement with Sigma Chi fraternity’s philanthropy week. Stephens, who is running against Diego Leal Ambriz, is Sigma Chi’s vice president.

“It was a stressful week, so now I can focus more on my campaign this week,” he said. “I will be hitting it hard and giving it more time.”

Stillwell said the extra week is like a “double-edged sword” because it also means the other executive vice president candidate, Kendrick Bryan, gets another week to campaign, too.

Bryan said he has talked to more organizations than the rest of the candidates running for executive offices but said the extra week can still help him out.

“I’ve enjoyed communicating with student organizations, and I hope to meet with a few more before elections to talk about their concerns,” he said.

Although the candidates will be able to campaign an extra week, they will also have to deal with an extra week of anticipation. Stephens said that’s the hardest part.

“I had it in my head for a few weeks that elections were this week,” he said. “Now I have to wait even longer, which is tough.”

Jessie said the positives of extra campaigning should outweigh any possible negatives.

“I’m sure they were all preparing for elections for this week,” he said. “But extra campaigning can go a long way.”