Current member of the Comms and Marketing subcommittee, Matthew Kurt is now running for the Officer role itself. The fourth year Economics and Sociology student has started his involvement with the Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU/AMLCT) back in 2022, when he served as a first-year rep under the then-convenor László Molnárfi. In the years since then, Kurt has accumulated plentiful experience, dealing with fundraising and video content editing in his role as the Vice President of Fundraising for Saint Vincent de Paul. He believes that this makes him a good fit for the job.
Kurt’s manifesto centres on three main themes: bringing in new voices, prioritising communication via video content, and establishing partnership relationships with small businesses. “I want to expand the voices that are being used in the campaigns, to make sure that every single voice is included from the very get go, as opposed to retroactively” he stated early on into our interview. “I want to include a first-year rep or an Irish speaking rep, to make sure those views are incorporated into the marketing.”
When asked about the second item, Kurt explained that he did not think that the current mode of communication with the students is the most effective. “The policies being discussed in Comhairle are things that the students care about, but if the marketing is very insular and not getting people in, then I don’t think it will reach as far as it could”. He believes that content in the form of short, informative videos sent regularly with updates on the events in the Union would be “less insular” and would get more students engaged with the SU.
“My experience with video content started with an initiative that we ran called Jailbreak, a collaboration between VDP and Amnesty International. Trying to get that off the ground started with promotional content, appealing to students when you have that much information and trying to condense into a high energy video format, was just something that I really, really enjoyed. I could put my little spin of it, making jibes at the corporate sponsors, making little jokes.”
If elected, Kurt wants to edit the videos himself, leaving the Comms and Marketing sub-committee to instead “be mostly involved in ideas.” He explains that, while it is difficult to describe the exact effect by just talking about it, he is aiming for his own take on videos similar to those of Beth Strahan, former Comms officer from two years ago.
“Those were the kind of videos I really enjoyed watching. Really informative but also had a very student feel to it. I think it’s really important that the video content is not just TikTok trends or checking off a list, but something that students actually want to engage with.” Kurt hopes that the exact thing he has in mind will become apparent soon, as he plans to make editing and posting video content one of the main features of his upcoming campaign.
Kurt also wants to expand the number of deals available to students. He thinks that, currently, businesses are not offered strong enough encouragement and ease when it comes to partnering with the SU. „The sponsorships pamphlets available right now are from 2021, so providing adequate materials and providing services where they can contact us, both from the TCDSU website and having a more prominent ‘here is how you can sponsor us button’”. He is anti-corporation and wants to primarily target small businesses based in Dublin. Once again bringing up the era of Beth Strahan, Kurt believes that it should be possible to provide “3 or 4 deals every week.”
Kurt’s copious experience with fundraising makes him confident that he will be able to secure collaboration with more businesses, either having worked with them before or having the skillset to establish a new relationship. He mentioned having, in the past, contacted “more than 200 businesses” for a SVDP fundraiser.
Kurt’s mindset regarding the campaign is primarily pragmatic: he believes he has the skills for the job and that should be the main concern. “My campaign isn’t centred on politics”, said Kurt.
That does not mean, however, that Kurt is afraid of voicing his own opinion. When discussing projects he would be passionate about if elected, he mentioned the importance of following the will of the student body in divesting Trinity and the Union from Coca-Cola. “The Comms officer to me is the link between the students and the Union. There is a lot of discussion about the links between Coca Cola and the Student’s Union, and that’s I think very important for the Comms officer. Both from my personal perspective, and because there is a BDS mandate, I and the students want to see the ties cut.”
During his time with the Comms and Marketing sub-committee, Kurt has worked with the current Officer, Channing Kehoe. He believes that it gave him a good sense of what to expect from the role. “From Channing” he said “I learnt how the role really works and what its limits are.” Kurt did make it clear, however, that his participation has not been sufficiently thorough. “I got to work quite closely with Channing, but the Comms and Marketing committee has not been as closely involved as I would have liked.”
Kurt plans to further his engagement with the SU in the coming months, mentioning multiple fundraising events in March the preparation for which is ongoing at the moment. He is also passionate about changes in the Union that would make engagement for newly elected members and officers easier in the early parts of the year. When asked about what direction he would like to see the Union change in, he said:
“There have been recent initiatives put forth in Comhairle to have, instead of voting on every single member of the ordinary committee member, to have some offices elected by form, which can be done much earlier in the semester. Which is a great change in terms of getting the committee rolling in the September instead of in January.”
When asked about his fellow candidates, Kurt once again stated that he does not want to run a political campaign. However, while he praised Alice Moran and Promise Okafor, he made it clear that him and Jacob Barron, who earlier this year had run for SU President with a controversial campaign seeking to deescalate campus activism, do not “see eye to eye”. “I think that people are running for the right reasons,” Kurt said, also adding that if he were not to graduate next year, he would be happy to work with either Moran or Okafor if they got elected. “but I am speaking more so for two candidates than the other.”
