Your Pick for President: Q&A with SLC president-elect Shelby Pick

With the elections over, SLC is preparing to usher in a new year of student leadership.

President-elect Shelby Pick is currently working in SLC as a Legislative affairs director until she is sworn in later this May.

Pick is finishing up her degree in business at LB this term and plans to begin pursuing her degree in early childhood education in the fall. She will also be looking to earn a bachelor’s in business at OSU. She has experience as an intern at the state capital working under Senator Tim Knopp and says she found her passion for early childhood education when working at a preschool in Redmond, Oregon. Pick is also a member of the United States Air Force Reserves.

Q: What would you say your personal mission statement is?

A: I think that my mission in life is to continuously promote others around me. That’s why I want to become a preschool teacher, because children at that age really need that support, they need that extra boost of confidence and they need opportunities to start learning at a young age, because a lot of communities don’t have that. I think at a college level we’re the same way. We just need the opportunity to grow and flourish and that’s why I got involved in [SLC]. We have so many opportunities to help students like the lunchbox and the energy assistance program, and there’s a million others…I care about seeing other people flourish in their life. That’s why it breaks my heart when I see homeless people and that sort of thing because I think that we’re surrounded with so many opportunities and I just want everybody to know that we have them and everybody’s willing to help if they’re taking advantage of those opportunities.

Q: Besides SLC, do you do any other community outreach activities?

A: Yeah. I’ve always raised cattle, I was raised on a cattle farm, and I’m highly involved with the 4-H and FFA community. I raise cattle and then I work with 4-Hers. So I will sell cattle market price to 4-H members in the community…Then I go and individually work with those students with their animals, helping them get confident with them, helping them with showing, helping them with speaking, helping them with presentations… that’s kind of like my giveback because I grew up in 4-H and I really flourished in that position and the opportunities that it gave me. I also go to old folks homes. I know that’s really silly, but I love old people, they are amazing and they have so many great stories to tell. My favorite are old veterans because they are hilarious and they just want to talk…Maybe that’s not technically community service but it’s just getting to know people and what makes them thrive.

Q: How do you plan to apply lessons you’ve learned from past experiences in student government to your new position as president?

A: Right now we are putting into action new binders to get our new members up to date and make the transition in easier. We’re kind of directing the whole SLC office right now and putting in better guidelines to help our students flourish…With our new interview committee we actually gave them feedback on their interviews so that in the real world they could go out and do better with their interviews. We’re doing thank you letter classes and classes on presentations so that as SLC members we can present ourselves better at a more professional level so that we can help others.

Q: What is a major issue facing students at LBCC that you would like to address?

A: There’s a lot. I think the main thing is that a lot of community college students are so different. We have a lot of students from OSU and a lot of them have federal aid and are funded and they’re okay. But then you have a lot of parents that are coming back to school that have their own issues and then you have old people coming in, and then you have new students. So taking all of those problems and being able to meet the requirements of all the students, I think that’s the hardest thing for a community college. Making sure everybody knows how we’re helping each of them.

Q: Do you have any early ideas on how to combat the challenges of such a diverse campus?

A: What we’re trying to do is implement an opportunity of ‘hey, this is what’s going on, this is how you can help yourself out.’ We also put up posters and try and get people involved and we try to talk. So we’re doing more class raps where we come into the classroom and we present on something. So right now I’m doing class raps on the Vote OR Vote campaign. But it could be on little things that are going on in school. Whether that’s an upcoming event, or a bloodrive, or the energy assistance program…I think our best way to combat it is just getting the word out and making people feel welcome and try to break down those barriers to where people have the support they need. Because a lot of students are scared.

If anyone has additional questions you can visit the SLC office at the northeastern part of the courtyard by Hot Shot cafe on the Albany campus.