ex sabb
interview
Norbert Bonnet Deputy President 2007-2008 Did you enjoy being a Sabbatical officer? I certainly enjoyed being a Sabbatical Officer and now that I have completed my studies and working, I am sure being Sabbatical Officer was the best decision that I have made as I can apply in my current job the skills developed while being in the Students’ Union and I can even suggest and implement new ideas based on what I have seen or done while being sabbatical officer. What experience can you take from being in office? As deputy president, working closely with the marketing department was the best experience because I was involved in various tasks and exposed to various decision making processes which allowed me to widen my knowledge. Many things that I have learnt in UPSU are helping me in my current job. Having been involved in different committees at different levels to represent the opinion of students has provided me the opportunity to be exposed to a range of perspectives of considering any topics being discussed and develop my critical thinking abilities. What would you do differently as a Sabb if you could go back? Attend only productive meetings which would result in concrete actions and stop going to meetings which were used a platform for individuals to say what people want to hear without actions. What was your most memorable moment being a Sabb? Brining international students to the forefront of the scene by raising issues faced by them to come up with the
relevant solutions and by using UPSU as a platform to organize several activities where international students had the opportunity to mix with British students. In my first year of study in Plymouth, the integration of international students was not really strong and I am pleased I did not only succeed in changing this but what I have introduced is still ongoing. Do you think you need to know a lot about the UPSU before being Sabbatical Officer? I think you should at least have some knowledge about the students’ union, how it operates and what the environment you will be working. If people think that the role of a sabbatical officer is to come into the job and change everything, then this is completely wrong. While you have to be flexible and understand that ideas that you might have are not achievable due to many factors that you did not take into consideration, you should also use your intelligence and not continuously let yourself being dictated on what you should do on a daily basis. I can use one specific example to highlight the importance of being flexible as in several cases that I have seen or heard where sabbatical officers did not complete their terms in office, it seems this is because of the lack of flexibility. Being the first elected Deputy President (sabbatical officer), one of my key tasks was to represent students from partner colleges. I was told that one of my key role is to ensure that students from partner colleges come to our campus and use our facilities. While this turned out to be accurate for students who live near our campus,
when visiting the partner colleges far from Plymouth, in remote areas and talking to the students, I have seen that a large majority are not even aware of the facilities and services provided by the University. So how can we expect people to use something if they are not aware of what is available to them? As a result, while I started my sabbatical year thinking of encouraging as many students as possible from partner colleges to come to the main campus, I eventually found out that focusing my sabbatical year on an awareness campaign about the university facilities and services would be more useful, appropriate and realistic while still facilitating the visit of any students to the main campus from students who wanted to do so. What qualities would be good for someone looking to do your role? Open to learning Outspoken Flexible without being dictated on what to do Action should match the content of speeches What do you miss about being a sabbatical officer? Challenging and questioning speeches or promises that are unrealistic or never put to practice