INTERVIEW
Incoming call: EDSA President It usually takes years and a ton of effort to make your way up into becoming a president of the European Dental Students‘ Association. Months of thinking, planning, and defining your goals before you send out your application...but no amount of time would ever prepare a president for the situation EDSA was facing this year. We sat down with Tin Crnić to find out more about the most unique and the strangest presidential term from all in the history of EDSA.
Tin Crnić, EDSA President; Ivana Ligusová, Magazine Editor-in-Chief a lot about the dental students‘ community, dentistry, and the functioning of the association. As EDSA has a powerful voice among various institutionsns, my primary goal was to make EDSA more visible to students, powerful stakeholders, institutions, and of course, more accessible to dental students. I was also encouraged by my friends, family, and also the past presidents of EDSA to run for the position and I have to tell you that it was a valuable experience and I loved and enjoyed serving the dental students‘ community every single day of my mandate.
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ood morning Tin, thank you for agreeing to be interviewed. The year of your presidency is almost over and we would like to hear your insights. Why don’t you take us to the very beginning, how did your journey in EDSA start, and how did you come to the idea to run for EDSA President? Good morning Ivana, thank you for having me. My journey with EDSA started with the EVP Zagreb back in 2016. Where I was a member of the Organising Committee; I was a second-year dental student at that time. It was a rewarding experience for me and it did not take long since I decided to join my very first EDSA meeting which
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was the 59th EDSA Meeting in Cardiff, Wales, Luka Banjšak was the President at that time. At first, it was the EDSA family legacy experience that caught my attention but because of that meeting, I got very interested in the functioning of the association and its activities. The same year I became a member of the Organising Committee of the EDSA Summer Camp Dubrovnik and I also enrolled as an EVP Officer of EDSA, durinValentineng Garyga’s Presidency. The year after I became the General Secretary, under Alyette Greiveldinger’s Presidency, and the term after that I became the President of EDSA. During those two years in EDSA, I have learned
How did you find the courage and confidence to run for the highest position in the association? I bet the weight of incoming responsibility is something that scares many potential candidates off. The courage and confidence came firstly from the big support I had from my friends and family, but it was mainly built through the years I spent in EDSA-either as a member of the Organising Committee of the EDSA mobility projects, or as a board member of EDSA where I had the opportunity and pleasure to meet a lot of people and created a great network. The position itself brings loads of responsibilities and for sure it looks scary when you put things on the paper, however, if you have the vision and the goal in front of you and the path you wish to direct the association too, the work you have to do and responsibilities you have, things do not look so scary in the end, but of course to put your visions into acts, you must have good quality people on the board,
