Get Involved with the GSC

The Dartmouth Graduate Student Council (GSC) represents all graduate students from the Frank J. Guarini School of Graduate and Advanced Studies, Thayer School of Engineering, and The Dartmouth Institute. We consist of elected representatives from each department in these schools and meet each month to make decisions on how to create a better community for graduate students at Dartmouth. We accomplish this goal by providing funding for graduate organizations, funding for individual students for travel and professional development, and reaching out to administration about larger issues that involve multiple departments.

Our current initiatives to improve the graduate environment include graduate student benefits, graduate student housing, and mental health awareness and resources, which you can read more about here. These initiatives are led by members of the GSC executive council and we welcome new members of the GSC, or non-members of the GSC, to get involved in these initiatives or start their own initiative. To accomplish our goals, we meet regularly with the Dean of the Frank J. Guarini School of Graduate and Advanced Studies, Dean Jon Kull, to share our concerns and find resources to implement changes that may improve student life.

Our executive council also has goals for each of their committees over the 2018-2019 year. Finance chair, Daniele Bellutta, has completely revamped the way we communicate our finances by making our monthly expenditures and yearly budget publicly available. Student life chair, Eva Childers, has focused on mental health and is beginning to create a student support network that will involve training graduate students to recognize warning signs in fellow students and provide help and resources. Social chairs, Michael Ko and Tamar Wheeler, have begun to collaborate with the Geisel School of Medicine to create a more inclusive social environment for graduate students and medical students. Communications chair, Savannah Barnett, has completely re-organized the GSC website and created a blog for graduate students, which can be found here and is always open for new submissions.

Additionally, we also fund and support many student organizations. For 2018-2019 we have a variety of active student organizations. Any graduate student can revamp an inactive organization, which can be found at the bottom of this page, or start their own organization by filling out this form. Without being a recognized student organization, any graduate student can also apply for funding to host graduate student events via standard funding by filling out this form. Make sure to check our calendar for all upcoming events hosted by graduate organizations, individual students, departments, and outside community organizations and be sure to submit your own events by clicking here.

The Graduate Student Council (GSC) is currently electing 30 representatives from 19 departments to serve on the 2018-2019 general council. Each department is represented by one graduate student per 25 enrolled graduate students in the department.

A GSC general council representative will advocate for needs of graduate students in their program and the graduate community at large with direct access to the Guarini School of Graduate and Advanced Studies through their executive council and their faculty advisor, Dr. Kerry Landers, Assistant Dean of Graduate Student Affairs. Each representative also has one vote to cast in matters dealing with current GSC initiatives, which can be found here, and money allocation to GSC-approved clubs, a list of which can be found here. They also serve as a connection between their program and the larger Dartmouth community with a responsibility to communicate with their program current work of the GSC, updates about Dartmouth campus and committees, as well as how graduate student activity fees are spent.

Voting for your representative is very easy, should take about 5 minutes, and can be done by clicking here.

Voting will end Saturday, 29 September at 11:00 pm. Representatives will be notified of their election on Sunday, 30 September by 11:00 pm and will serve at their first GSC meeting the following week on Tuesday, 02 October at 6:00 pm in Carson L01. All graduate students are welcome to attend these meetings at any time. If you have any questions about the process, have issues with the voting form, or have concerns you’d like the GSC to address in general, please feel free to email the communications chair here.

The first meeting for new representatives will take place on 02 October at 5:30 pm in Carson L01. If you have any questions about what it’s like to be in GSC or other ways to get involved, email the communications chair by clicking here.