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| The DSU's president-elect Courtney Larkin (Nick Pearce Photo) |
Sitting in her office, Courtney Larkin is asked to recall her most memorable ±«Óătv moment. Her answer comes without a momentâs hesitation: Orientation Week.
âI was extremely shy on my first day, and very scared,â admits the native of Cole Harbour, Nova Scotia. âBy the second day, I had completely lost my voice from cheering. Some of my best friends now are from those few days. I got to meet a lot of people, and I remember meeting the VP Student Life at the time and thinking that would be the coolest job in the world.â
Four years later, Ms. Larkin holds down that very job with the ±«Óătv Student Union, organizing activities to increase student spirit on campus. She planned last yearâs James Bond-themed Orientation Week to rave reviews, and put together the most successful Charity Ball in recent Dal history, raising over $4,000 for Bide Awhile Animal Shelter in Dartmouth.
As cool as that job has been, ±«Óătv students have given Ms. Larkin a promotion for next year. Last month, she was elected president of the ±«Óătv Student Union and will represent all of the universityâs 15,000-plus students as leader of their student government.
Itâs a fitting role for a student who declared herself a Dalhousian at a far younger age than most. âI remember going on field trips to see shows or performances at the Rebecca Cohn, and thinking âI want to go here,ââ she recalls with a laugh. âI decided that I liked Dal one day, and ever since, thatâs all I wanted to do. I was probably 12. Itâs the only school I applied to.â
Thatâs not to say that her ±«Óătv experience has gone exactly as planned. She spent her first two years at Dal studying sciences, working towards a career in dentistry. But a course in entrepreneurship taught by Ed Leach inspired another path, and now she is working towards a Bachelor of Management degree that she expects to finish the year after next.
âI love my program,â she says. âThe people in the classes make a lot of the difference ⊠we do group projects all the time and itâs a lot of creative stuff, which I really enjoy.â
But itâs Ms. Larkinâs role as a student leader that defines much of her ±«Óătv experience. She was the president of the ±«Óătv Science Society and worked as commissioner to the DSUâs VP Student Life before taking on the role herself. This January, she decided to run for the DSU presidency. Following a hard-fought campaign â during which she still had events to plan and VP duties to attend to â she narrowly emerged the victor after three ballot counts.
âI was completely in shock for a few hours. I knew that winning was a possibility, but I honestly wasnât sure what would happen,â she says, recalling her feelings when the final result was announced to a packed house at the Grawood campus bar.
When she settles into her new office in May, sheâll be channelling that excitement into her new responsibilities. Her goals for the next year emphasize building on the work the union is currently undertaking: continuing the âImagineâ student consultation process; advancing the interests of students through government lobbying; and developing the Halifax Student Alliance, a municipal lobby group established this year to draw attention to student safety issues. Ms. Larkin also wants to make sure the executive team voted into office alongside her can work together to achieve a variety of objectives.
Most of all, she hopes to do a better job in reaching out to students, helping them understand and appreciate the unionâs role on campus.
âA lot of students have this impression of the DSU as merely a âgovernmentâ; that theyâre not part of the union if theyâre not involved in its politics,â she explains. âI really want students to get more engaged with our services, events and other functions, creating awareness of what we do â and what we can do â for them.âÂ
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