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It was a year in which Dal bid farewell to one president, welcomed another, wrapped up the biggest fundraising campaign in its history, opened new buildings and launched new schools and programs.

So, yeah: 2013 had its share of big headlines here on Dal News.

But beneath those headlines were literally hundreds of stories on award-winning faculty, accomplished students, impressive community contributions and some fun features as well.

We published a total of 507 different stories on Dal News in 2013 and had a record number of visits to our site — more than 615,000. With support from Student Services and Athletics, as well as our student team and other contributors, our coverage ran the gamut from large to small, eventful to entertaining.

From presidents to big research

Obviously, a presidential transition is a rare event in Dal’s history, so the handover from number 10 (Tom Traves) to number 11 (Richard Florizone) was a big part of the university’s year. We sat down for a and covered his goodbye events including a and . Weeks later, we covered Dr. Florizone’s first day in office, published our and helped . In October, we were there as Dr. Florizone was , delivering to the Dal community in his new role.

The installation celebration also brought university leaders from around the world to campus, and helping cement and extend Dal’s global reach at the same time. (Look for a forthcoming feature exploring Dal’s relationships with those countries in more detail.) It was one of several times last year where we looked at the international side of Dal, from to launching a new profile series called highlighting international voices in the Dal community.

Dr. Florizone wasn't the only notable newcomer on campus: in August. The Agricultural Campus had a number of major events this year, from annual highlights like and to .

It was a big year for campus research and faculty stories too. HÂþ»­ launched the Institute for Big Data Analytics — the first of its kind in Canada — as well as the and the . opened its doors in June. Dal profs published headline-generating research on everything from to to , to . And there were big awards too: , , as well as awards for , and .

Then there were the student successes: among them, , , and all the exceptional students celebrated at the , just to point out a few. The university also , , Canada's first Ocean Sciences undergrad degree and . (For more on what's changing in the Dal classroom, .)

As for the Tigers, Dal's varisty teams brought home AUS championships in , and ; there was also controversy, with at the start of the year. (.)Ìý

We profiled a bunch of student societies on Dal News throughout the year in and ended the year celebrating Dal as . (Astronaut Chris Hadfield will come to campus to share in that celebration sometime this year.)

Bold accomplishments

One of the year's biggest Dal announcements was that of the Fountain School of Performing Arts, which unites the Departments of Theatre and Music. It was and then . The gift announcement came the same week as , besting its goal and bringing in $280 million to support scholarships, academic programming, research, infrastructure and more. Some other big donor stories from the past year: and and the .

And we’d be remiss if we didn’t note some of the Dal community’s contributions to both the university and its surrounding community this past year: from to raise money for the Make-A-Wish Foundation, to , to the School of Occupational Therapy’s Tanya Packer taking part in .

As for which stories were our most popular with readers, one stands head-and-shoulders above the rest: , which launched in late August. People kept returning to that story throughout the fall through search engines; it ended up with more than 13,000 total views. Two of the most popular stories related to North Korean prison escapee Shin Dong Hyuk, who came to campus after Dal students took up the charge of raising awareness of his cause. The rest are a mix of stories: pop culture, serious issues and, well, it wouldn’t be Dal without a popular story on parking, would it?

Dal News' 10 most-popular stories of 2013:

1. (August 27)
2. (March 7)
3. (June 5)
4. (September 20)
5. (December 3)
6. (December 3)
7. (September 26)
8. (February 14)
9. (August 13)
10. (March 7)