Board
From left to right: Ysbrand Burgstede, Sterre Kuijper, Max Liebe, Rachel den Otter, Ben Ligthart, Tristan van Marle
Picture by Thomas van Wanrooij
Rachel den Otter | | Chair
Greetings! I’m Rachel den Otter. I am 20 years old and finished my second year of CreaTe last academic year. My roots lie in Key-town, or as the commoners know it; Leiden. Moving to Enschede to study CreaTe meant a lot of explaining the difference between Enschede and Twente to friends and justifying my movement to the 'countryside' for this vague study that is CreaTe. Luckily, I have never had to regret my move due to the warm welcome I felt within CreaTe and the wonderful community of Proto.
Even though most of Proto was online during my first year I did get a taste of the kind people and fun activities Proto organises. I was really happy to join the SportCie at the online committee market in my first year. Even when most of the plans we made got cancelled the next week due to corona, I still had lots of fun socialising and coming up with new ideas. Later I also noticed in other committees how realising activities and events that you can enjoy with other members thrills me. During my board year, I hope to further develop my organisational and leadership skills and with this help evolve Proto further as the beautiful association it is!
Contact me at chair@proto.utwente.nl
Max Liebe | | Secretary
Heyho, my name is Max Liebe. I am currently 20 years old and finished my second year of CreaTe last year. Despite my name, I am actually not German. I grew up in Laag-Keppel and Hummelo, which are small villages in the Achterhoek. As such, I am not unfamiliar with rural life. After a year of carpooling back and forth between my hometown and Enschede with a good friend of mine, I decided to move to a room on the campus, where I still have my residence today.
One of my main reasons for moving here, despite being partly forced by lengthy public travel connections, was that I very much liked the atmosphere here in Enschede. Although I was already fond of Proto and, as I am quite a technical person, an active member of the Have You Tried Turning It Off And On Again Committee, I became really invested at the start of my second year. At this point most of the corona measures had been lifted, meaning that Protopolis was open and a lot of activities were being organised by the study association. Because of this I quickly got to know a lot of members and everything Proto had to offer. Wanting to contribute to this wonderful experience as well as wanting to organise activities myself, I decided to join the KICC and apply for a board year. With this, I hope to learn what it is like to be responsible for a large association and how to go about organising a multitude of activities.
I feel incredibly lucky to be in the situation I am in right now, and I am very much looking forward to working together with the rest of my board to make this year a great one!
Contact me at secretary@proto.utwente.nl
Ben Ligthart | | Treasurer
Hey there! My name is Ben Ligthart, currently I am 20 years old and the treasurer of Proto. For my whole life I have lived in the beautiful city we all know, Enschede. In my first year of CreaTe during the period of corona I stayed home with my parents. However, Proto gave me the opportunity to still partly enjoy the student life. In the first module I joined my first committee, the EducaCie, and shortly after that the First Year Committee and KICC followed. Although the events were held online, I immediately fell in love with the ambiance within Proto.
In my second year I moved to the Witbreuksweg on campus and went a bit overboard with the committee work by joining six of them. I really enjoy organising activities, although it can be hectic at times, the reward at the end is always worth it. That is partly why I decided to sign myself up for the board.
As treasurer this year I will make sure the financials of Proto are stable and are not invested in bitcoin. It will be quite a task to learn everything there is to know about being a treasurer, but I am really looking forward to it. I hope this year we can have the first year in a while without any quarantine measures but instead enjoy the student life like it is supposed to be!
Contact me at treasurer@proto.utwente.nl
Sterre Kuijper | | Officer of Internal Affairs
Hi! My name is Sterre Kuijper, I am 21 years old and I am doing my second year of the Creative Technology bachelor. After coming back from travelling during my gap year I started studying in my hometown in Deventer. This is not too far from Enschede and since most of my first year has been online I managed to finish it from there. Mainly because of my close friends, we encouraged each other a lot to study online but also just to have fun.
I joined Proto during my first Kick-In, but I haven't been active until the beginning of my second year. That is when I joined the SportCie and became active within some helper committees. From that moment my social life within Enschede began to grow, so I went to live on campus. I started to join more drinks and became promotion responsible for the TIPcie. Next to that, I really enjoy doing sports, mainly football, and sometimes I go for a run. I am very happy that we have guitars in the protopolis, so every now and then you could hear me play some songs. At some point I started to consider doing a board year and I got more enthusiastic when talking to my friends about it who were also interested. I got really invested in the social life of Proto and started to enjoy the activities even more.
I feel very lucky that I am part of this board and I hope to fulfil the role of Officer of Internal Affairs with a lot of enjoyment. I am looking forward to organising a lot of fun activities and meeting new members.
Contact me at internal@proto.utwente.nl
Tristan van Marle | | Officer of External Affairs
Hey all, I am Tristan van Marle. I am currently 21 years old and I have finished my second year of Creative Technology. I was born and raised in Kampen, and moved to Enschede right before I started studying. I joined Proto during the Kick-In and became a member of the First-Year Committee after the second committee market.
Even though a lot was online I really liked the energy from Proto and the other members, which made me become more active in my second year. I joined the Activity Committee Extraordinaire as well as the SportCie at the start of the year. I really enjoyed all the committees, activities and the awesome people I have been able to meet. This enjoyment is something I would love to pass on to all members.
I am excited to be the Officer of External Affairs. I am on my way to connect Proto and its awesome members to companies. I believe that CreaTe and I-Tech students offer a lot of great experiences, out of the box ideas and a great mindset. My goal is to convey this to companies and connect them to our members. Overall, I am really hyped to connect with students and companies!
Contact me at external@proto.utwente.nl
Ysbrand Burgstede | | Officer of Educational Affairs
Howdy! My name is Ysbrand Burgstede, I am 20 years old and like all of the lovely people listed here above me I am also in my second year of CreaTe. I was born in Haarlem, raised in Holten and am currently living on campus.
My first year of study was spent in Holten behind my laptop, and while doing so I missed out on Proto almost completely. This was until I got asked to be a part of the Have You Tried Turning It Off And On Again Committee, which I joined in the last five minutes of the last meeting of the entire year. This committee, along with having active friends, had sparked my interest in Proto at the beginning of the second year, and slowly more of my social life and free time became associated with this study association. Events in the evening were even a part of the driving force for my move to Enschede. Since then I have joined the Camp Committee, have been at a lot of social activities and just generally have had an awesome time.
I am really looking forward to helping our students out, continuing the work of improving our study programme and in general learning a lot from running the association!
Contact me at educational@proto.utwente.nl
You can reach the board at board@proto.utwente.nl