Rob Gheorghiu recently stood down as the President of the Sustainable Development society, having run the society since the beginning. Here, he reflects on his time as President.
What would you say has been your highlight during your time as President of the Business and Sustainable Development Society?
To be honest, I don’t have any specific highlight from these two years. Just being constantly involved with these people – execs, students, event guests – in whatever kind of activity we did was an absolutely brilliant experience and a privilege. And I don’t make this claim lightly.
However, the first 2-3 months when we were putting the society together were particularly notable. The team was composed of 17 international students, from 8 different countries: China, India, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldavia, Pakistan, Romania and Russia. Out of these, 13 students were in their first year of study and just came to the UK for the first time as well. We all just met in the span of three weeks… and… well… we had no idea what we were doing…
A lot of ideas were floating around, and, as you can imagine, finding the common denominator was proving quite difficult. The experience of trying to bring together all of these different views and inputs had a big impact on me.
You were a founding member of the BSDS. What advice would you give to students who want to go down this route and start a new society?
I would advise them to find 2-3 like-minded students and start/plan the society from top to bottom. After that, depending on the society’s requirements in terms of its various roles (Marketing, Events etc.), find other people to join the Executive Board. Also, find out the needs/ wishes of the potential members and start from there when planning your activity.
Be organised, be very clear on what your goals are and make sure you follow them through. In these types of initiatives, there can be a lot of enthusiasm at the beginning, a lot of talking, but no action at the end of the day.
What do you plan to do with all your new found free time?
Start studying!!
