June Executive Blog

June has been such a busy month for me and the other members of the executive team. As explained in the May Executive Blog, Melinda Goertz unfortunately decided to resign from her role as the Vice President External and Student Affairs (VPEX), which then triggered a by-election. I worked closely with Melinda on the Member Engagement and Communications (MEC) committee for the past year, and I was sad to see her resign her role. She has excellent leadership skills and she generated so many great conversations and ideas. Thank you for your time and contributions as VPEX, Melinda, and I look forward to continuing to work with you on council!

During the by-election, Natasha Donahue was elected as the new VPEX (congratulations, you deserved it!) and I was elected as the Vice President Finance and Administration (VPFA). I officially began my role as VPFA on June 3rd and I have been loving every second of it. I am honestly so grateful to be given this opportunity and I wanted to say thank you to all the members of council who supported me.

As you can probably imagine, getting elected into a remote full-time job is not exactly conventional. For the past three weeks, I have been just trying to absorb as much information as I possibly can. Most of my time has been spent teleconferencing with the other members of the executive team, attending various meetings, going through documents, and just familiarizing myself with the VPFA role. I have learned so much in such a short amount of time, but I know I still have so much more to learn. A big thank you needs to go out to the other members of the executive team for helping me transition into this role. Everyone has truly been so patient, helpful, and supportive, which I could not be more grateful for.

On June 3rd I also chaired my first Awards Committee meeting, which went really well. There were 107 applications for the Awards Committee to review, which included 12 #Igo2AU applicants, 18 AUSU Bursary applicants, 32 Balanced Student applicants, 39 Returning Student applicants, and 6 Student Volunteer Applicants. There was a lot of great discussions surrounding some really strong applicants. 

Another major highlight of June would definitely be the 2019 AUSU Council Retreat which was held on June 14th and 15th at AUSU’s Edmonton, Alberta office. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend the retreat in person, though I was able to attend and participate via teleconference. During the retreat, our student council was fortunate enough to meet with Dr. Alain May, who is the AU Associate Vice President of Student and Academic Services, and with Gilbert Perras, who is AU’s Chief of Staff. We also had the opportunity to discuss our goals for the upcoming year, the budget, policy development, advocacy priorities, our executive workplan, and so much more. There were so many great discussions had and tons of great ideas were put forward. I am so fortunate to be working alongside such friendly and driven individuals.

Until next time,

Brittany Daigle
VP Finance and Administration