Matters of the arts

Amelia Wilding is this year’s arts representative, but the job didn’t come easy. The third-year student ran in one of the largest and tightest races in last week’s elections, winning 149 votes and beating her opponent by 27.
Even though she spends most of her class time at Dalhousie, where she’s majoring in political science, the Vancouverite is a familiar face here at King’s. Her prominence in the King’s community dates back to October of her first year – she featured in the King’s Theatrical Society’s production of Agamemnon. We sat down with her during her first week as a King’s Students’ Union councillor to find out what she has planned for this year.
The Watch: What made you interested in running for arts representative?
Amelia Wilding: I had been thinking about it a while when the elections came up – what I wanted in an arts rep and what I felt the campus needed. I would like to be the person to help things to grow and to become more accessible to students. I thought, “Alright, if I have these ideas, I may as well try and pursue something that would help students here at the school.
W: In your election speech you spoke about students here at King’s are not having their needs met in the best way, that our available resources aren’t being used to their full potential. Elaborate on this. What changes will you make?
AW: Resources that we have with administration at the school. Sometimes and not all the time, there seems to be a separation between students and administration. The experiences I have had with the registrar’s office and the advancement office have been positive. The advancement office is a great resource to meet alumni and to have alumni be in contact with students. Something that actually happened this year… Frosh week normally gets funding from the Alumni Association, but this year they weren’t able to, due to lack of communication. So being able to open that up and have alumni be resources for students is necessary to build a community beyond what we have here, and just continuing the legacy of what King’s is, which is fantastic. And general resources that the KSU have made even more available. Making it clear and telling students: this is here for you to use and we have funds set aside for you to use on any project that you would like. Also just ratifying societies even more and making the process very clear to students in how they can do what they want while they are here”
W: I understand you are involved with the KSU FVP. Do you think there will be any conflicts of interest, and if so how will you avoid this?
AW: Not really. Obviously we’re going to discuss things, but no more than any other members of council. My interests are my own interests and his interests are his own interests. We are very clear. I’m sure we’re going to disagree on things, but we’re also going to agree on things. But that is not going to define our relationship. He is great, really supportive, he’s awesome. It’s great to discuss things with him, but it’s the same way I would discuss things with anyone else on council.
W: What problems do you currently see for arts students?
AW: I think there is a lot of not miscommunication but non-communication between here and Dalhousie. It seems this year there is more being done in trying to integrate King’s into Dal through a lot more poster-ing for events at Dal. This is great, but I’d also like to see this get put in TWAK (This Week at King’s), so people will actually go. If you’re at Kings, you’re going to be taking most of your classes at Dal, unless you’re doing a full Kings degree. And there shouldn’t be a rivalry. Also, for a lot of arts students the prospect of finding employment that is actually relevant to their degree and relevant to what they want to do is really hard. Being able to provide that opportunity would be great.