Elizabeth Morris, 25, loves making the college experience the best for students.
Morris, who goes by Liz as well, has been with the Durham Collage Student Association (DCSA) for the past two years.
She began at DCSA (formerly known as DSCI) after graduating from Durham College in 2019.
“I’ve been with them for the past few years in different roles,” said Morris, “they can’t seem to get rid of me.”
Recently, DCSA made a new role for her.
“I’m really excited about it,” said Morris. “So, they introduced a new role for me, which is exclusively student network and student engagement coordinator.”
Morris was involved in school government before college.
She attended Eastdale Collegiate Vocational Institute (ECVI), in Oshawa, Ont.
She had a lot of school pride.
Her time at ECVI was spent being involved in student government and a few clubs.
“When I was at Eastdale, I was the head of the arts club and then I went on to become the Deputy Prime Minister of the school,” says Morris. “I really loved my experience working in student government.”
She loved getting other students involved in what was going on around the school.
Originally, she thought she wanted to go into interior decorating after high school.
“I did take a little stumble where I tried to go for interior decorating, which wasn’t quite my thing, but I discovered PR,” said Morris. “It was absolutely perfect for me because it has a lot of elements of promoting the organization versus just selling a product, which is something I’ve always really loved to do.”
She worked for Riot Radio (RR), DC’s radio station, as well during her college years.
Dan MacInally, the RR station manager, recalls how helpful Morris was during her time at RR.
MacInally and Morris first crossed paths in 2018, while Morris was volunteering as an assistant technician at RR.
“We had a vacant full-time position and were right in the middle of a busy semester with many student shows and college classes scheduled weekly,” says MacInally.
“We needed help quickly and we hired Liz as a part-time student to help,” says MacInally. “We were extremely lucky to have her during that time, she helped keep the studio up and running and brought an infectious energy to the studio that students and staff greatly appreciated.”
She started her own club, Mad Youth Durham, while in college after seeing so many talented students.
“So, I decided that it’d be great if we could all connect and really get to know each other, but be able to help each other,” said Morris. “So, from there I started up that club and we started having art shows, which was really cool.”
She had around 10 art shows in the Durham Region, which were able to highlight the different artists and give them that confidence.
That is where she fell into the interim role at DSCA as the event planning and club management role.
“So, whatever I can do to expose students to the best opportunity to get involved and the best opportunity to really get the most out of their college experience,” says Morris, “is what brings me so much joy.”