For your convenience

Here are two links from google docs.

http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=ddsrnwd6_15gw5bvpgc

The first is the email that I've sent out last week regarding our social justice visit to Little Sisters of the Poor. The link here is just a reminder that I will use in the future emails, instead of sending the entire email out again. It is also so that you can easily look for the details as it is available here on the blog.

The second link below will be Jean's powerpoint slides on her presentation last Friday. A few of us requested for the slides, so here they are available for your viewing :)

http://docs.google.com/Presentation?id=ddsrnwd6_0ghhmwhfd

Enjoy :)

President - Amanda Johan

I am thankful to be given the opportunity to be COSDU president. There are so many things that I have learnt from this experience, let me share with you some of those things.

As the president, I have learnt to be patient and considerate. As a person, I tend to want to fix any problem as quickly as possible and often tend to neglect others’ feelings. This journey has made me realise that getting the easy way out from a problem does not really solve the underlying issue. I need to be a good listener and be open to all the different point of views. Not everyone will have the same view as me and I will never be able to change their mind as we are all individuals who are entitled to our own voice and opinion. Things can get heated and tension starts to build. This makes me realise that I am only human and God is teaching me a very valuable lesson. I believe that He will never give me a test that we can’t handle together. As human, we can only make plans and He will lead the way. I have learnt to have faith in Him.

I often forget the fact that I am in COSDU committee to serve God. I will start relying on my human strength and instinct. Fortunately, God is forgiving; He has not forsaken me even though I have neglected Him. I learn to seek for mercy and forgiveness, to be humble and to accept my weaknesses.

There must also be a balance between the spiritual as well as the official duties of a President. Below is a short list of these official duties:

1. Oversees and ensures the overall smooth running of COSDU
2. Takes care of each ministry of COSDU and takes care of every committee member
3. Supervises and delegates tasks to committee members
4. Chairs committee meetings
5. Organizes Committee Retreat at the start of each semester
6. Seeks the spiritual guidance and liaises with the Chaplains on a regular basis

I am not perfect as a person as well as a leader. I am still learning and will continue learning even after the end of my term. I was certainly not prepared at the beginning and never knew that there is so much to learn and comprehend as a President. Hence, I urge anyone who has the desire or still considering being the next President to give it a try. You don’t have to be an experience person. What you need is the passion and love for God and COSDU; and be committed to your term. You also need to realise the responsibilities that comes with the post and to persevere when things get tough. Remember, you are not alone as the President. You will have nine other committee members who will support and help you throughout your term. Do not be afraid as this will be a fulfilling journey for you. Trust me, you will not regret it. Thus, pray about it and let God speak to you. Everyone is welcomed to talk to me, even if it is not for the President role; you are still welcomed to approach me.

Every single moment as COSDU President is a blessing to me. The good times makes me happy and the bad keeps me stronger. I really enjoy the journey and will definitely treasure the friendship and the memories I made along the way. I thank God for giving me this opportunity and I thank the members for having faith in me to lead COSDU. To my committee, I thank you for all your support.

Love

Amanda

Vice President - Jessica Tan

Being in COSDU for the past 3 years has really changed my life here in Melbourne, it has brought me closer to God and I feel that it has fulfilled its mission statement “family away from home, growing together with Christ”.

“To be the vice president is to be the Jack-of-all-traits of COSDU’s committee.”
–Sr. Theresa, International Chaplain (2002-2007)

“Love One Another, As I Have Loved You” Luke 22:1-38; John 13. I believe that this is one of the greatest commandments that god has given us. Being VP has been very fulfilling, I feel that I have truly grown a lot as a person, it has taught me to be more patient and understanding towards the needs of others.

Many times working in a team with nine different individuals has been really challenging, we went through a lot of ups and downs and whenever I face any difficulties in the committee I will always keep in mind the bible quote “Love One Another, As I Have Loved You”

When I first took up the job, I was very confused as the VP didn’t have a fixed role and I really didn’t know what was needed of me. However, after being in the committee as VP for the past one year, I realized the most important thing a VP has to do is to support the president and the committee members. To just be there whenever anybody needs help, and most importantly is to take the initiative to get to know each and everybody, to support and help the different ministries.

A few main Responsibilities:

1. Logistics- Basically keeping track of the music equipments and Items bought for COSDU. Updating the inventory list every semester, or whenever COSDU buys anything.
2. Supporting the session coordinator in making sure there are enough materials for each session.
3. Helping out with the planning of sports day and scavenger hunt.
4. Getting Sponsorships.

Lastly, I would just like to thank the members for truly making this experience a very exciting and fruitful adventure. I would not have done this without the support of all of you, especially my fellow committee members. Even though we sometimes we do have our disagreements but it has been a pleasure working with all of you.

As for my future successor, if any of you are thinking of running for vice president, my advice is do not be afraid, as god is always with you, pray for his guidance and calling. All you have to do is be open to each other in the committee, learn to forgive one another, be friends, support one another not just with your own portfolio, pray with and for each other and lastly as I mention before take the initiative to get to know and help one another.

One thing that I regret not doing is finding sponsorships for COSDU, so I do encourage the next Vice President to actually try to help COSDU find more sponsorships and remember we are the only catholic youth group on campus, what makes us different from other youth groups is we do not IMPOSE our faith but the main thing is to PROPOSE our faith through our actions, and then we can truly call ourselves followers of Jesus Christ.

Love

Jess

Secretary - Donna Yeo

For my birthday, I received a gift that says “Secretaries are loyal, efficient, dedicated and secretly run the world!”

“Loyal |ˈloiəl|

giving or showing firm and constant support or allegiance to a person or institution”

I see the secretary's job as one of supporting your fellow committee members and coordinating between different organizations and people to make sure that everything goes smoothly. How do I define support? Making sure that that your fellow comm members has all the tools necessary to make his/her vision a reality. Obvious examples include finding a location to host the event, or equipment to write. Less obvious, by supporting them spiritually and emotionally, if they are in need. As for allegiance, this may not be an issue to some, but it took a lot of effort for me to do what is best for the cosdu instead of what I wanted to do.

“efficient |iˈfi sh ənt|

(esp. of a system) achieving maximum productivity with minimum wasted effort or expense

• (of a person) working in a well-organized and competent way

• [in combination ] preventing the wasteful use of a particular resource”

Time management is essential. Wastage is the anti-thesis of efficiency. An example would be getting grants from the university. Because there is a dateline for all paperwork (forms will be your best friend), not submitting relevant forms on time would be a waste of this valuable resource. Organization. Remind everyone of what they have to do and when they have to do it. Additionally, I try to make it a point that I can answer whatever questions my committee may have. Spending time guessing the answer, then searching for it and realizing that most of the guesses were just fluff is not productive Don't know the answer? Find them. Take the opportunity to increase your knowledge. Haven't you heard, knowledge is power.

“dedicated |ˈdediˌkātid|

(of a person) devoted to a task or purpose; having single-minded loyalty or integrity

(of a thing) exclusively allocated to or intended for a particular service or purpose”

May 2008, I did not get the opportunity to give me speech when I ran for secretary in the previous AGM, so I'll recapitulate the essence of it here. I have always rejected positions where leadership or commitment is required. Selfish as it may be, I preferred to do as I pleased, when I pleased. In early 2008, the divine intervened, pardon the audacity of this statement, and I felt that if there was ever anyone or anything I wanted to commit to, it was COSDU and the people that were in it. I'm glad I did, for cosdu and company certainly formed most of my fond memories of 2008. Integrity. You will have access to a lot of information. For example, member's personal information. So what I will say is DONT MISUSE YOUR POWER.

“Secretaries are loyal, efficient, dedicated and secretly run the world!”

The giver of the gift does knows the truth of the matter. The secretarial job, or by any other name, exist in almost every organization and I will say this, secretaries do, in fact, rule the world!

Treasurer - William Lim

A treasurer's job can be summed up in one sentence, in a nutshell, he/she takes care of COSDU's finances.

Which includes a few aspects, the obvious ones would be safeguarding COSDU's petty cash and bank account, record all transactions, keep and maintain all relevant receipts and documents, and finally generate the financial statement in AGM and report on COSDU's finances in the past 1 year.

As the treasurer of a club under student union (UMSU), one task would be filling out forms in applying for grants, and other paperwork related to it. As the treasurer of a not-for-profit religious society, another task would be ensuring we have adequate funds in running various events throughout the year by having fundraising activities, and leaving enough money for the continued existence of COSDU.

Which brings the next point, one important role of the treasurer is to try to balance our finances, which is to raise enough funds to cover our expenditure. One way to do this is to have an idea of what events would be held in the term and budget accordingly, and run fundraising activities to meet those budgeted expenses, or make a formal request of a grant to the Archdiocese of Melbourne. The main activities would be the sale of movie tickets, Festival of Nations and Night Market, and other sources of income are the collections we have in masses and the membership fee we get.

Requirements for a treasurer would be:

·         A basic knowledge in accounting.

-          Not so much on knowing what is debit or credit (though knowing would certainly help much more), since the records we need to make are fairly basic entries of incomes and expenses, but rather the format of the financial report and bookkeeping.

-          If you don't have it's ok, you just need to learn it during the handover period.

·         Honesty

-          Self-explanatory.

Other things that would help in being a treasurer are the same things that one needs in other things, skills like being attentive to details, careful, knowing how to manage one's time well etc.

Ok above are all the things you need to know in becoming the treasurer of COSDU, some tips in being effective or other technical details in doing a treasurer's job will be passed to the next treasurer in the handover. Of course being the treasurer doesn't mean your scope of work only relates to your position's portfolio, you will be supporting the committee and helping in all things run by COSDU.

If all you want to know is what a treasurer does, you can stop here, the following would be some boring and mundane sharing of mine in being the treasurer of COSDU.

I've been in COSDU almost my whole university life, i remember joining it near Easter in my first year of uni and went for the Easter Camp shortly after, so COSDU has really been integral to my university experience. Sadly to say, the first two years haven't really been fantastic, my uni experience that is, while i attend COSDU's sessions regularly, i don't think i have ever fully involved myself in it, like every other thing in uni. But still, COSDU would be the thing i look forward to every Friday, and it really has been the family away from home in a foreign country for me.

I wasn't serious in anything i did in the first two years, even when i ran for social acitivities coordinator in my second year, and deservedly so i lost to a person who was more committed. After two years of wallowing in wilderness, i have sorta come to my senses and decided to run seriously for a position in COSDU, to do something for the community which has given me something to look forward to in a foreign land, and most importantly to be more active in university while i still have the chance. And to be frank, also to put something down under my university  extra-curricular activities section in my resume :P

So i ran for the position of treasurer, being the position closest to what i'm studying and also being the position of something i'm most interested in. I thank the members of COSDU for giving me a chance to give something back to COSDU, and thankful i am indeed. Throughout this term, i can confidently say i have grown and matured to be a better person, and i'm not just saying this perfunctorily in every stepping down speech, i truly have changed and improved in being a better person, at least slightly better than what i used to be (a wanker, if you still think i am one, i apologize and will continue to try to attempt to continue improve myself).

It is through works that one can really learn and change. Only when one is doing something useful can one sense meaning and satisfaction, this i firmly believe.

I think i'll stop here before i further bore myself, this sharing is pretty much about my personal journey and i didn't talk much about journeying with my fellow committee members, not enough space for that but i believe my fellow comm members would have such sharings.

All in all, it doesn't really matter what position you are running for, so long as you are running for one.

Social Justice Coordinator - Anastasia Agusto

The first time I heard about the term ‘Social Justice’ was when I first came to Melbourne in 2007. It was when we were introduced to our then social justice coordinator, Celine Yong. Naturally, I didn’t know what that was at first. However, after attending sessions after sessions impregnated with her diligent updates on social justice issues, prayers offered during the rosary month as well as the social justice sessions conducted by her, I think I finally understand what it means now. To me, ‘social’ involves people, justice is justice. Therefore, I see it as helping people who need help fighting for their own ‘justice’, regardless of what their ‘justice’ means: their self worth, their survival, companionship, shelter, anything! They are the poor, the lame, the lonely, the rejected, the hated, wounded etc. In short, the special people who simply want to be LOVED.

We, ourselves need love too albeit in varying aspects. Thus I believe we are able to empathize with those in need and provide help accordingly. All it takes is a little bit of effort to put ourselves in someone else’s shoes and think: ‘What if I’m put in the same situation?What would I feel? What would I need?’.

What I am trying to get as is, ANYONE can be a social justice coordinator, don’t ya’ think?

What can you do as a social justice coordinator?
- Whatever you can! Some of them:
- Organize weekly volunteering sessions to whichever institution you deem plausible (in terms of distance, time, tasks, etc)
- Social Justice Session once or twice per semester. These will usually be on Fridays. Last semester’s session was: Can War Be Just? You can call a speaker down for these sessions, or you can conduct them yourselves. You can even play a video and do a small reflection on it, followed by perhaps some group discussions. Knock yourself out, really!
- This one will henceforth, as decided by the 08/09 committee, be an annual COSDU event: An actual Social Justice Session involving hands-on experience on serving the community. This is on a Saturday. It will have to be an outing with the COSDUANS to whichever institution chosen and do community service as a group. The first one is coming soon (May 16th), so keep an eye out for your email and keep that day free. It’ll be a great experience, I promise! ;D
- Update COSDU’s board from time to time about social justice issues or simply just email the COSDUANS about these issues. Any relevant seminars that people can attend can also be included in these emails.
- If you want, you can also prepare some social justice related prayers for ‘Prayers of the Faithful’ in COSDU’s monthly mass. This will help take 2 prayers’ load off your fellow committee member, ie: the Liturgy Coordinator.
- If your committee decides on saying the rosary before each Friday session during the month of rosary, you can prepare some prayers to be dedicated each decade.
- Of course, you are to help, when possible, other committee members with their task.
- One of the must do thing for this post is: HAVE FUN WHILE CARRYING OUT YOUR RESPONSIBLITIES.

There are other things that you can do too. They’re just too many to list down.

If you are interested in becoming the next Social Justice Coordinator and have questions to ask me, don’t be shy, just email me or ask me when you see me. DO NOT be afraid of not knowing what to do. I have a HUGE file here that has a lot of information on what can be done, who to contact, plausible institutions to go to, what magazines to buy, to read, what news websites to browse for social justice issues etc. It is very helpful. I am happy to answer your questions even after you’ve assumed this position. I will also help whenever possible. Just ask, okay?



Looking forward to you succeeding my post!
Have a little faith on yourself :)Anyone who loves can take this on :)

Many happiness,
Anastasia Agusto

Sessions Coordinator - Angela Liew

Sessions Coordinator 2008-2009

It had never crossed my mind that I would be a part of the Committee until a month before the AGM. I was just talking to a friend about the upcoming election and that conversation sparked the thought of me serving God through COSDU. I knew very well that if I did join the committee, the only role I was interested in was “Sessions Coordinator” because since I first joined COSDU, I was interested in sharing various knowledge about our faith that I have learned from the previous youth group I was in.

So to all of you who are interested in taking up this post, I’d encourage you to pray about it. Believe me, God will speak to your heart, and if it feels right, you’ll know that you should run for that post.

• Before you can do anything else as a Sessions Coordinator, you must first involve God. Pray for his guidance in planning the sessions. Ask him to inspire you. He will.

• Then, begin by brainstorming all the topics surrounding our faith that you think are interesting or important.

• Ask other COSDU members what they would like to get from the sessions.

• Consult Sr. Delma and Fr. Michael.

• After you’ve gathered all the ideas and feedback, narrow the topics down to those you think would benefit the members most. Remember, it’s not about what you like or want, but what is good for the group as a whole.

• Work on planning your sessions during the holidays so that it wouldn’t take up too much of your time during the semester.

• Book the speakers early if you have any. Try to speak to them first so that you can convey to them what you expect to get out of the talk.

• Try to improve each session as you go. You’ll learn through experience. Don’t take it too hard if it doesn’t go well. Just keep praying and surrendering to God.

I must say that this role has challenged me to seek God’s will first, to depend on his guidance, to trust in his providence and most of all, to put my selfishness aside to serve him.

This role is truly an important one because sessions are the core activity for COSDU, so do consider it seriously because your decisions will affect everyone who attends the sessions. Nevertheless, do not be afraid, because He will give you all the grace you need to do His will. All you need to do is to say yes and let Him lead. I’m always happy to guide you if you need any help. You’re not alone.

Liturgy Coordinator - Janan Lee

Roles and Responsibilities

The main duties of a liturgy coordinator are facilitating the smooth celebration of any COSDU masses and providing information about important events on the liturgical calendar to the members. The task of organising a mass involves close collaboration with the celebrant, the music coordinator and altar servers. In addition, readers, offertory aides and communion ministers have to be assigned before the commencement of each mass. The liturgy coordinator is also responsible for the design and provision on mass booklets. For those creative bugs out there, this is a wonderful opportunity to put your skills to great use.

Keeping COSDU members informed about landmark events, such as Feast Days, on the Church’s calendar is also vital. By delving into the life stories of our saints, we can be inspired and nourished by their actions and apply it in our daily lives.

Looking Ahead

In conjunction with World Youth Day 08, the Melbourne Archdiocese launched a Catholic Youth initiative headed by Bishop Tim Costelloe. COSDU plays an essential part in this youth revolution. Last year, we were tasked with the project of organising a WYD Reunion Mass held in August for university students around Melbourne. In May this year, COSDU will be co-planning a Tertiary Mass for youths with representatives from the Australian Catholic University. Many more exciting opportunities will definitely exist for the next Liturgy Coordinator to foster better relations with our fellow youth organisations.

Serving in the committee is a truly rewarding experience and being the liturgy coordinator has indeed deepened my knowledge about the Eucharist Celebration. If you would like to find out more about this position and what it has to offer or ask any general questions about serving in COSDU’s committee, feel free to speak to me or drop me an email.

See u at AGM 09!

Janan Michael Lee

Music Coordinator - Bernice Lim

Aim:

As the music coordinator for COSDU, the greatest aim and biggest commitment should be to provide for music in Cosdu, both for mass and weekly praise and worship, so that through songs and through music we are able to draw people closer to God. It is essential that the person in this position should be able to encourage musicians to use their talents to serve God in this ministry as it is indeed a very fun and fulfilling ministry. It is important for the coordinator to be enthusiastic about music and enthusiastic about using this wonderful gift that God has given us to give glory and praise to His name.

Responsibilities:

The responsibilities that is entailed with this role includes choosing appropriate songs for mass and praise and worship sessions, preparing the sheet music for the musicians, organising music practices, leading the music practices, arranging the transportation of the instruments, setting up and packing up the instruments at the venue. However, the biggest part of it is leading the musical direction of the group.

Qualities:

Having said that, possessing good leadership skills and knowledge of music is important to be successful in this role, though not essential. This is highly recommended as often the responsibility of merging different playing styles and techniques of the musicians together is not easy. One does not have to be the best musician in the group to lead the group, but the more important aspect of leading in the music ministry is that one should be able to facilitate the abilities and great talents that all musicians are blessed with, and put them together.

Music coordinator also acts as a facilitator to members in the group. He/she needs to nurture members’ interest in music and strive to build members’ self esteem and confidence in performance. By providing a supportive, motivating and a stable framework, it will encourage members’ ownership of performance and an increased level of group commitment.

My advice:

Initially, I was quite hesitant to take on this role and run for this position during AGM as I did not believe that I was right for the job due to my lacking talent in music. However, having been serving cosdu in this role for almost a year now, I feel that I have definitely learnt so much from it, and without a doubt, it has helped me to grow both as a person and musician.

So, I'd just like to encourage anyone who is interested in running for this position to just GO FOR IT cause I believe that God always have a plan for us and if you just give Him the chance to do something great through you, then definitely, you WILL NOT regret it.

Publicity Coordinator - Audrey Teh

Looking back now, it’s been a year now that I’ve been with Cosdu. I remember so clearly when I joined last year, the previous committee members were asking me if I had ever thought about running for a position. I never thought that I would actually be able to fully commit to weekly responsibilities outside of my own busy schedule. My biggest worry was that I would not be good enough to live up to the expectations of the rest of the committee if I do get elected. I was never really a person with a strong faith in my religion, but knowing that I had the kind of support and friendship that was shown to me during last year’s AGM, I was confident that I would be able to perform my tasks. I guess in a way it was God’s will that I’ve involved myself with a commitment to this catholic society and I am so very thankful for that.

Now, here I am instead, standing on the opposite end asking around if anyone would be interested in taking over my position when I hand over all of my responsibilities. Being a publicity coordinator of Cosdu was definitely an experience that I would always treasure with me. Among the responsibilities of my role which is the most familiar to you, would be to handle the cosdu email account and to send out weekly emails with information regarding the weekly sessions, mass times, other events and music practice. This has definitely always been a challenge for me, especially while balancing work, study and cosdu, as it is a weekly task. There must be great attention to detail as these emails sent out contain information that are relied on by all members of cosdu. I’ve also had to be very attentive in checking my emails and work closely with the rest of the committee in case of any urgent emails that I had to forward to everyone else. Despite all of that, I think sending emails is FUN, because I get access to information first =D

What I also do is to constantly update the blog with the semester line-ups of sessions, summaries of past sessions, pictures of events and anything related to cosdu. The main blog readers could be members who are not included in the mailing lists, members who have their emails lost in their inbox, or maybe just some who prefer to read a blog than an email. Hence, the blog has to be well maintained and very informative.

Aside from these weekly tasks, the most important responsibility and major event that I’ve had the joy of organising would be the Orientation Weeks in semester 1 and 2. There were ups and downs and lots of preparations leading up to the event itself, but all in all, everything was a success as I knew I could always turn to any of the rest of the committee members for help. Basically, all you have to do is to publicise cosdu as much as you can through flyers or chalk writings (I call it legal vandalism) and obtain as many members as possible to expand our family in faith. It’s exciting meeting people at the booth and actually wondering if they’d come back.

When the exam periods are looming around the corner, grab a pen and a notepad and start approaching everyone, asking for their exam dates. This goes into the exam prayer calendar on the blog, where we can all pray for each other.

Being where I am right now, I’ve realised that I’ve grown a lot by being in this position. I used to be so afraid of sending out emails to a list of people that it’d take me forever double-checking and triple-checking each and every word typed. I do it faster now :) I’ve also managed my fear of expressing my thoughts and writing out loud on the blog. I used to be someone who just went for sessions, stayed at the back and kept quiet. It wasn’t till I took over as publicity coordinator that I began speaking up and putting myself out there, being the one who speaks to people first. It’s always a daunting task, but of course, what I always aim to do is to remember each and every member’s name when I first meet them for the first welcome session. A smile and a friendly chat can really make them feel less awkward and adjust more easily to their new group of friends. As for me, I’ve found friendships within cosdu that I would treasure for a lifetime :) And as for the times that I have failed as a good publicity coordinator, I apologise to my fellow committee members.

So, if you are interested in running for this position, trust in yourself that you are capable of doing what you put you heart and mind into and leave the rest to God. I assure you that it will be a rewarding experience, socially and spiritually. I wish you all the best!

Lots of love,

Audrey Adrianna Teh

Social Activities Coordinator - Hilary Heah

One year has flown by so quickly, but nevertheless, it will certainly be one of the most memorable moments in my life being the Social Activities Coordinator for COSDU. I can still remember clearly last May when I was successfully elected for the position during the annual COSDU AGM. How did I feel? Well, it was a mixture of different feelings, both good and bad. At first, I was scared that I couldn’t balance the responsibilities given with my studies as my workload was piling up tremendously. However, it had all worked out well in the end as I learnt to uncover the “sweet spot” of finding the right balance between my studies as well as my role as a Social Activities Coordinator in COSDU. This has undoubtedly been the best ability I’ve obtained throughout the year and has certainly made my term in COSDU fun and worthwhile. COSDU has certainly enriched my life in many ways, from the spiritual to the social aspects, which was the main reason why I joined the society in the first place.

So, heading straight to the point, what are the roles and responsibilities of COSDU’s Social Activities Coordinator? Starting from the weekly sessions and monthly masses, the social activities coordinator has to plan and decide on where the after-session ‘fellowship’ dinner takes place. This has certainly been one of the many challenges I faced during my term. Factors such as location, types of cuisine, vegetarian or non-vegetarian and price were some of the many factors that had to be taken into consideration. Also, to make things even more challenging, most of the restaurants do not offer bookings for a large crowd, especially on Fridays as most restaurants are full and busy on that day. There were many turn downs from restaurants throughout my term; however, that didn’t stop me from trying to book different restaurants every time as I wanted to ensure that none of the COSDU members would feel bored of the same restaurants and that it would be something that everyone would look forward to after the weekly sessions or monthly mass. I’ve also received many feedbacks and recommendations of restaurants from members, which had certainly made my job easier. I personally believe that these ‘fellowship’ dinners aren’t just like your normal everyday dinners, they are very important after session follow up that strengthened the ties between members, which was why I looked at it very seriously.

As a Social Activities Coordinator, I would say that the main highlight of the job would be to organize 2 major COSDU events, the annual Sports Day and Scavenger Hunt. In my opinion, I would say that these events would be the most difficult part of the Social Activities Coordinator. You would have to think about the logistics and location and to ensure that everything runs smoothly on that day. There will also be administrative protocols that have to the complied by liaising with the student union (UMSU). Other than that, you would have to decide on the team distributions, games to be played, health and safety measures, and last but not least, food! Despite all of these, it has certainly been very satisfying seeing the members enjoying themselves during these events and knowing that these events went well. And to make things easier, the rest of the committee were always there to help in any way they could. I would have not been able to handle everything if not for them, so kudos to you guys!

On top of that, you would also be helping out during the Festival of Nations and Night Market organized by MUOSS during the semester.

The one regret I had during my term as a Social Activities Coordinator was failing to carry out the weekly sports session that I had initially planned out. I certainly hope that the next person that takes over this position would seriously consider starting this weekly program as it would certainly be another way of the members getting together, and for a good purpose too! =)

But overall, I found that my time, both as an ordinary and a committee member has been very rewarding. The many friends I’ve made throughout my time in COSDU has certainly been very memorable. I can confidently say that the friendships I’ve obtained in COSDU are the ones that will last for a very long time, and possibly, forever. I can’t be more thankful for that.

COSDU has also strengthened my faith as a Catholic with the many sessions and activities that were lined up. To be honest, I wasn’t a very “knowledgeable” catholic as there were many things that I wasn’t aware about in the Catholicism context. COSDU has certainly opened my eyes on this and at the same time, reaffirming my faith.

So in conclusion, for those of you who are interested in running for the Social Activities Coordinator position, I would just like to reassure you that taking this position can be extremely rewarding in both the social and religious aspects to it. Sure, you might be faced with challenges along the way, but hey, what’s life without challenges right? It will only make you stronger and more matured in that sense. But remember, do it for the wellbeing of COSDU and not for your self-interest all right? Good luck! =)

Research Seminars

Here are some research seminars if any of you are interested:

(click for larger image)