One of the most active bodies of AEGEE-Europe will welcome new members to their team and again NetCom has motivated and talented people as candidates. We have talked to one of the NetCom candidates, Meltem from AEGEE-İstanbul, about her motivation to become a Netcommie, her plans, goals and much more…
Can you tell us how your life is going like recently ? Will we see you present at the Agora?
Currently I am a third year bachelor degree student and studying Industrial Engineering. At the AEGEE part of my life, I am Secretary of AEGEE-İstanbul and subcommie of Tika Kukhianidze and I am also the coordinator of spring NWM-İstanbul and working on thematic part as well. In brief, I am trying to balance my AEGEE life and my studies just like most of the AEGEE members. And yes I will be present at the Agora.
You are already a subcommissioner, what was your motivation to become one in the first place?
After getting into AEGEE and later on attending my very first NWM I began to be interested in NetComs’ work and duties. After then, to share my experiences I gained in AEGEE and to support locals work and of course to support Tika with her duties, I wanted to be a subcommie.
Meltem with AEGEE-İstanbul and Europe on Track Members
As a subcommie have you had any difficulties in your work and if so what they were precisely?
Deadlines. The most challenging problems are the ones that you can do nothing to solve. Otherwise there is always a proper way to solve every kind of problem. For example some of the locals were facing problems with their universities and their geographical regions. At that point there is not much you can do and that was the situation I had difficulties with in my work.
Regarding your experience,what difficulties are locals in AEGEE having?
AEGEEs’ biggest power, but also its biggest problem is its human resources. We are having problems with defining AEGEE precisely and with expressing ourselves. That is simply a negative effect to our PR and that naturally turns into a human resources problem too. Getting those new members who will be active and involve in AEGEE is hard because of this reason. Hence I can say that human resources is a big issue for locals in AEGEE.
Do you have any suggestions that you would like to share in order to conflict the problems with locals?
Knowledge transfer. Any kind of training courses or meetings are crucial to develop locals, knowledge of the members and also the network, because there is not a book that you can read that can teach you how AEGEE works. You can only learn by experiencing it. Only if you become a part of it and contribute you can understand what exactly it is. If we can transfer the knowledge that we all gained, AEGEE can be active for many years more. Locals have a big issue at that point because every step begins with becoming a member of a local.
What do you think about the mentor system that you stated to be created among locals?
Apart from the mentorship system project of NetCom, what the mentor system I think is about is mentorship for specific goals like projects, events, LTC’s or even RTC’s among locals. Because for locals it is quite possible to hesitate about being a mentor of a local for a full term. Also most of the time the human resources cycle of locals don’t have a long term as well to put all their effort and motivation in supporting a local. This works the same with organizing an Agora and calling for helpers from other locals. I believe that can link locals among each other and can motivate them.
Can you specify a little about your expectations from your subcomissioners team, if you get elected?
Not having a “subcommie team” but having a “team” that will work all together and support each others work. Especially I wish to have contact with every local one by one and that only can happen with an efficient subcommie team.
Written by Deniz Özhan, AEGEE-Eskişehir