The glue between Kraket, members and the VU

Hi member! My name is Sun Wester, and I am the educational, internal, and marketing affairs officer of the 50th board of Kraket. In this SECTOR article I will tell you about myself, and what a week in my life looks like as a board member. To introduce myself briefly, I am currently in the 4th year of my bachelor, and I follow the track Econometrics and Operations Research. During this past board year, I followed some extracurricular courses, and I am aiming to finish my thesis this year so that I can start with my master’s degree next academic year. It might be exceptional to have three functions in a board year, and I do have to admit that it is a lot of work. However, the functions are connected in a way that it almost makes sense to combine them. As the internal affairs officer, you are the main contact point for your members in an informal setting. It is your job to make sure that everybody feels included, and to provide them with committee opportunities that suit them. On the other hand, you have the educational affairs officer. This function brings you in contact with your members as well, but it is mainly study related. You make sure that they are enjoying their studies, and you are their voice whenever a certain course does not meet its expectations. Last of all, as marketing affairs officer you are responsible for the promotion towards everybody, both online and offline. I share this function with Denise van Dijk and my responsibility is the online promotion. Again, with the online promotion you reach your members and make sure that they are up to date about all the activities that Kraket has to offer. Besides these similarities, the three functions have other tasks as well, but all in all the three combined results in a week with lots of contact with members, teachers, and other parties. Below you can read what a week in my life looks like.

Weekend

My week starts the weekend before Monday. During the weekend I make sure that almost all promotion for the week is ready to be posted on Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn. Together with Denise, we make sure that we have all material needed; a picture, promotion text, link to the website, etc. In this particular week, it was very busy on social media, with 5 posts, 8 stories and a reel on Instagram, and a FaceBook and Linkedin post. It is almost never feasible to finish all posts, but I do try to get most of the posts that can be finished, as ready as possible.

Monday

On Monday we always start with a board meeting at 9:00 in the morning. During board meetings we all reflect on what we have done the week before, as well as look forward to what is going on in the following weeks. Even though we have had 27 board meetings, we almost never manage to start on time. We try to finish our board meetings by 11:30, such that the room can be opened for our members on time. At 12:00, I had another meeting for the first-year activity that is organized together with VSAE. We met via Zoom, both chairmen of the committees and the marketing affairs officer of the VSAE board were present. This was a nice first meeting with a new board member from VSAE, since the board of VSAE just switched. As an internal affairs officer, it is also your duty to maintain good contacts with your brother and sister association and thus such a first meeting is always nice. During the meeting we brainstormed for fun ideas for the activity. Right after this meeting I had two active member talks, at 13:00 and 13:45. The first one was online and the second one was in person. I really like having these meetings with our active members, since they always have good feedback for the committee, and I get to know them even better. Next up, at 14:30 I had a Sport and Games meeting. As internal affairs officer you are the supervisor for most informal committees, which implies that you are present at most meetings they have. During this particular meeting we talked about the final things that needed to be done for the Game Marathon. Unfortunately, I had to leave this meeting early since I had another active member talk at 15:00. My last meeting of the day was at 15:30, which was for the master committee. This year, I take part in this committee myself. During this first meeting for the master committee, we brainstormed for the Master Day and came up with some nice ideas. In between these meetings, I finished some Instagram posts, checked both my internal and educational affairs officer mails, and tried to take small breaks as well. That evening, we had the Master cocktail workshop, so I stayed at the VU to study a little bit and work on my thesis. For dinner I treated myself to a nice poke bowl. During the cocktail workshop, I mostly enjoyed myself with learning about cocktails, and since Denise unfortunately could not be there, I tried to make sure that enough pictures were taken for the website. After the cocktail workshop, I enjoyed some beers at Rembrandt plein, and went home at 00:00.

Tuesday

The second day of this week started at 9:00 with a meeting with the Speeddate committee. This meeting was online, and we made a nice start for this new activity of Kraket. After the meeting I had more active member talks, at 10:00 and at 11:00. At 12:00 I had a meeting with Eric Beutner, he is the program director of both the bachelor and the master in econometrics. During such a meeting, I provide him with all the feedback I have collected concerning education. He in turn gives me answers or provides me with arguments regarding the feedback, and otherwise he tells me who I need to contact to get the feedback with the right person(s). Besides the formal part, we always have a nice informal chat as well. After the meeting with Beutner I had a small break in which I tried to make a start for the promotion video for the chairman. I decided to use a new video editing program, and it was fun to figure out how it works. At 13:30 it was time to film some shots for the electoral committee. As I am also a member of this committee, it is more work than just being the supervisor. However, I do enjoy making and executing the promotion plan for the search for the new board. For one of the shots, we replicated a talk with someone from Sophistès. After this shot was taken, it immediately turned into a small unplanned meeting in which I received an update of what Sophistès is up to. At 14:30 I had my last active member talk of the day. My agenda for the day was done, so I spent some hours finishing the promotion video, and stayed a bit longer on the VU to do some studying. I went home around 19:00 and got a nice meal salad for dinner.

Wednesday

Every Wednesday starts with an electoral committee meeting at 9:00. We are currently busy with the promotion for the new board and are already brainstorming for the next step of our committee work. We always block in 2 hours, in which we both have a meeting, and already start working on our action points. After this meeting I had a small break in which I worked on some ideas for new templates for Instagram posts. At 12:00 I had another active member talk, and at 12:45 the Happy Hour committee had a meeting. Since this committee has a lot of activities in a short amount of time, I offer as much help to them as they want. For now, they are very busy to provide the members with a nice beer cantus, and an (un)forgetful EGW 3. At 13:30 I had the meeting with the first-year committee. During this meeting, we went over the meeting from last Monday about the VSAE X Kraket activity, and their own activity that will take place in April. It is always a lot of fun with them during committee meetings in which a lot of jokes are made, whilst at the same time they work very hard to organize nice activities. At 14:00 I had another meeting with the study trip committee. This meeting was online, and we went over their renewed plan for the study trip. Since this committee mainly contains very experienced members, I mostly listen to their discussions, and I am there if they have any questions for the board in general. Furthermore I take notes of their discussions, so I can tell the board what their plans are during the next board meeting. After this meeting I had the last active member talk I needed to conduct. At 18:45 we had the game marathon, so before that we ate with a group together in the Kraket room, and I did some administrative work for some upcoming activities. During the Game Marathon, I mainly enjoyed myself since the committee planned the day very well. After the activity finished, I stayed with some people at Il Caffè and went home at 1:00.

Thursday

Thursdays and Fridays are quiet days for me. Since I was very tired from the night before, I stayed a little longer in bed, and went to the VU around 12:00. At 13:30 the Kraket Inspiration Day started. The KID committee told me what my tasks were for the day. Since my only task was to guide a group to the right rooms during the market, I had a very calm day. It was nice that I could just enjoy the activity, without being too busy for once. I really enjoyed the entire day, and I talked with a lot of interesting people. At 18:00, during the drinks, I did unfortunately have to leave to work on the promotion video for the internal affairs officer. After the KID and the drinks, I went home and studied a bit in my room. All in all, it was a nice relaxing day for me.

Friday

As said before, Fridays are quite calm for me. I need to be in the Kraket room from 10:00 to 13:00. Since there are not that many people at the VU on a Friday morning, I take my time to enjoy my breakfast, and start to make a marketing plan for the next week. Then, when people walk in the room, I enjoy having a talk with them over some coffee. Furthermore, I try to get some studying done, but it is not always easy to concentrate in the Kraket room. This particular Friday, it was very hard for me to focus, and I just talked with everybody that came into the room. In the afternoon, I had a meeting with my project group to work on the assignment we needed to hand in that Sunday. At around 20:00 I made plans with some friends to go to a bar and end the week with a nice cold beer!

I hope this article gives you a good description of my week as a board member! If you have any questions, feel free to send me an e-mail, or just come by the Kraket room!