The annual Spring Concert has become an event that students anticipate at the beginning of each spring semester. This year, students will have a new topic concerning the concert to discuss: the new selection process. Past years have entailed a seemingly complex voting process requiring multiple rounds of voting, for which actual participation numbers had been dwindling. However, this year has witnessed a more efficient voting process and an increase in student involvement.

Hosted annually by the Amherst College Program Board (ACPB), the Spring Concert has attracted such acts as Third Eye Blind, The Decemberists and Guster in recent years. The process generally consists of the ACPB constructing a preliminary list of artists based on a set of criteria such as availability, price and popularity. The student population then votes on the list. The artist who receives the most votes is invited to the College and is able to, through funding from the ACPB, offer a free concert to students.

ACPB Chair Jennifer Rybak ’10, spoke about changes that have been made to open up and add transparency to the selection process. While the initial implementation of the changes took place last year, they were not as successful as the Program Board had hoped. This was mostly rooted in the fact that the program was new. Voting turnout was exceptionally low, and it seemed that students were unsure about how the altered process was supposed to work.

To remedy the low turnout, the ACPB focused more on exposure this year. “We [placed posters around] the campus asking for suggestions, ran an open forum, tables in Keefe and took suggestions via e-mail and in person,” said Rybak, describing the new process.

This year, rather than having multiple rounds of votes, eliminating the artists with the lowest popularity each time, there is a new scoring system. The new system allows for instant runoff of the musician with the least votes, and rather than just voting for one group at a time, students were asked to offer a first, second and third choice. If a student’s top choice was eliminated, their vote counted toward their second choice and so forth until one artist was determined the winner.

With the recession still looming on the horizon and the numerous zeros following any given artist’s name, students should be glad to hear that the ACPB has a set budget that has been carefully managed, and while the current artist being considered seems to be comparatively reasonably priced, Rybak made it clear that the ACPB is willing to spend the entire amount allotted and use “whatever amount of money to make the most happy.”