Congratulations to Katie Taylor, who has been elected as DCSA President for the 2025-26 academic year.
Katie is a PhD student in Theoretical and Applied Linguistics. She has just completed her first year of study, focusing on Forensic Phonetics, or the use of speech recordings in criminal investigation, with a particular interest in the accuracy with which we can determine a speaker’s gender identity from a sample of their speech.
Having previously completed her undergraduate and Master’s degrees at the University of York, Katie initially chose to apply to Darwin because a friend from York was also Darwin-bound. A visit to the College cemented her choice, with the gardens and the immediate sense of community combining to make her feel at home.
“Despite being a postgraduate college, there is a strong focus on socialising and getting involved in different activities, something which I can definitely see reflected in the number (and variety) of societies in Darwin and in the role that the DCSA plays within College life,” she says.
Katie served as Co-President of this year’s May Ball, an experience which sharpened her appetite for greater involvement.
“As part of my role, I worked closely with a number of different teams in Darwin, as well as the rest of the May Ball committee made up of other students. I saw how much the DCSA had to offer, and how hard everyone works behind the scenes to make the College such a lovely place to live. I decided that I wanted to do my part in creating the same experience for the incoming students as I was lucky enough to experience this past year.”
Her prospective schedule sounds busy already.
“I plan on continuing to work with the DCSA to run a plethora of events throughout the year, from coffee mornings, welfare dog visits and the famous Darwin BOPs, to salsa classes, yoga sessions, and wine and cheese tastings! Additionally, I hope to continue working on some of the projects that the 2024/25 DCSA committee began, including working with the College to ensure that we are helping to improve student experiences amidst a cost-of-living crisis, and to achieve their goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2032.”
Good luck to Katie as she takes up her new role, and thank you to outgoing President Joshua Bickler for all his hard work on behalf of Darwin over the past year.
