By Madison Franks, Student Writer
OTTERBURNE, MB – If you have been around the Providence Otterburne campus this year, you will recognize Celina Loewen’s familiar face. Celina just finished her third year in the Psychology program, and brings plenty of realness, joy, and loud laughter to Providence. She is also the outgoing Student Council (STUCO) President and is someone who Providence was proud to have as their student representative. In her role, she listened to students’ needs, met with faculty and had ideas for ways to improve Providence, among many other duties that brought positive change to the hundred-year-old university.
Because Celina engaged in so many different activities as President, it was difficult for her to choose the thing that was most enjoyable. After thinking through the list of tasks she performed, Celina answered that “participating in the Faculty Council meetings was one of my favourite things because I love my professors!” Celina saw her meetings with the faculty as a way to further improve the life of the student body on campus, which was reflected when she continued her answer by saying that she continually aimed “to serve the students as best as possible.” Sitting in on these faculty meetings was something she always looked forward to because she saw this as a platform to bring up student concerns, as well as to share things that were working well on campus.
Despite the many positive impacts being the Student Council President has had on Celina, she nevertheless recognized some hardships too. “Leading the STUCO meetings themselves was one of my biggest challenges coming into this role because I wasn’t familiar with doing something like that beforehand. I think I got better at it as the year went along though!” No one would know Celina had no prior experience based on the way she ran her team because she led things so naturally from the start.
Although the specific experience of running meetings was new to Celina, she had spent the year before in the role of Resident Assistant, which provided her with the opportunity to gain confidence prior to stepping into presidency. “Becoming the President was like stepping out of my comfort zone,” commented Celina when reflecting on September and the first week of running the Student Council team. “I realized I had the potential of leading something. I learned to really take action, to take requests and concerns, and to actually do something about it.”
While Celina learned a few things about herself, her faith was also strengthened through the experience of being President. “I learned to show mercy and grace to other people when they do something differently than I wanted them to or if they made mistakes. God has been gracious, merciful and loving to me, so giving that back to the people around me was something I tried to do as President,” said Celina. More than this, Celina said that the Lord provided her with a lot of support as she tried to balance presidency and school, and she mentioned that God gave her people who acted as good supports for her too. “My friends, the other student leaders, and Brady and Ruthie supported me so much this past year. They saw the strengths and qualities I had in me before I became President, and they were all vocal with me throughout my role when they saw those strengths playing out.”
As the 2024-2025 school year is now complete, Celina left this parting advice to the people who will be taking on this role in the future. “Faculty meetings can be kind of intimidating, but the professors actually do care about what you have to say. They’ll listen to you. Your words hold a lot of value to them because you know the students best.” She also added to “find your own way of doing the presidential role. Every person is unique and have different approaches to how they lead.” Celina’s leadership style has been characterized by her loving presence on campus as she showed a genuine desire to hear the stories of her peers and share the needs of the students with the faculty to elicit real change. Even though Celina’s “reign” has now come to an end, this legacy of authentic compassion and care will live on well after she is gone from Providence. More than that, it will likewise inspire future Student Council Presidents to live out these qualities too.
