Saskia Hendriksen | Faces of FEB
The Faculty of Economics and Business is a faculty with great diversity of people. But who are these people? Within ‘Faces of FEB’, we talk to different students of the faculty and give a little peek into the world of these FEB students. This week: Saskia Hendriksen talks about her experience of being a student assistant at the UG.
Written by Jessica Paas
Could you tell me a little bit about yourself?
My name is Saskia and I am currently studying Marketing Management. I have been living in Groningen for 5 years now, so this is my sixth year as a student. I am mainly busy with my thesis these days, but I also work as a student assistant. Besides that, I do a lot with my committee and as far as corona allows it I do nice things with my friends!
What bachelor programme have you completed?
I did the bachelor International Business (IB). After completing my Bachelor’s degree, I did an extra minor in psychology. Since a minor only takes six months to complete, I still had 6 months left before I could start with my master. This is why I started studying Graphic Design at LOI, which is a type of home education. This was a lot of fun. Even though I had to get used to online education because of corona, I have learned a lot about Graphic Design, and it still benefits me. In September 2019, I started the master Marketing Management.
How do you like it so far? Is your thesis going well despite the circumstances?
I like it! I have almost graduated and my thesis is also going well. I think it's not very different now than usual. A thesis is something you do by yourself anyways. However, my housemate also only has her thesis left, so all the people around me do not really go to the university anymore. This feels a bit strange.
And you are also working as a student assistant, right? What is it exactly that you do?
Yes! As a student assistant within a specific course, you are basically supporting the professor of that course. I have been teaching the course Global Supply Chain Management, which is a course for first year IB students. I had to lead specific tutorials, listen to presentations of the students and check the assignments that the students had to submit. The students also had to review an article. This was something I also had to check. Next block I will be a student assistant again, teaching another subject!
Sounds good! How is it to be a student assistant nowadays?
I taught Global Supply Chain Management two years ago as well. Back then, it was for a whole group of students. The group consisted of 16 students and you had two hours to complete the tasks. But, because of corna they split this into two time slots, meaning you have 8 students per hour. The goal was to have more interaction this way. It was a nice initiative, but precisely because I only had one hour, there was less room for this interaction. That was a bit of a shame, but despite that, I still managed to have some interaction with the students! Also, teaching online is more efficient as you can do it from home, so overall, it was not worse than teaching offline!
How do you keep interaction within your tutorials?
It is a bit more difficult online, but we try to solve it by encouraging students to give feedback. If a group finishes with a presentation, the other students have to give feedback. That helps! And what I emphasized at the beginning was that they could at any moment use the hand raise button. Really emphasizing that you can interrupt at any time also helps people to be more interactive.
How did you come to this position?
One of my friends from college was a student assistant the year before I started. She had a very high grade for a specific course and so she received an email saying something like 'hey we are looking for student assistants and you had a high mark; do you want to join?' When the following year she said she was going to do it again, I thought to myself, 'I would like that too!' So yes, then I joined!
What do you like the most about this job?
At first, I was doubting whether teaching would be something for me. However, I actually think it's amazing and I really enjoy it. Especially because they are first year students. So, for example with online exams, a few of them were a bit stressed. I like to give them a little bit of wisdom and support them in their journey. So that's what I like best: not necessarily transferring the subject matter, but giving advice on how best to study and to reassure them that they can handle it. I think that's important to do; to give them the feeling they can handle it all, because they can!
If someone would like to become a student assistant, what do you advise them to do?
I happened to hear that it was possible the first time I became a student assistant. However, for the course next block, I saw the vacancy was on Nestor. So, you might want to take a look there. And if you had a course that was taught by a student, you can always email that course to see if they are still looking for people!
What are you planning to do after you have graduated?
I will be graduating in February. I think I will be looking for a job afterwards. I would like to stay in Groningen. However, I'm not really busy with planning what I would like to do yet. I don't want to work for a very large company, so I do not have to start applying so soon!
| Last modified: | 31 January 2021 3.57 p.m. |