Osqledaren #4 2022/2023 JOURNEYS

Osqledaren #4 2022/2023 JOURNEYS

Editor in Chief Benjamin Javitz

Responsible Distributor

Benjamin Javitz

Layout Benjamin Javitz, Roisin

Callaghan

Cover Page Roisin Callaghan

Print Norra Skåne Offset

Paper Pages: 100g Amber Graphic

Cover: 250g Multiart Silk

About Osqledaren

Osqledaren has since 1959 been the magazine of THS, the student union at KTH.

Published quarterly with around 10 000 copies per issue, the magazine is distributed to Student Union members. Our mission is to cover, investigate, and review the happenings within THS and KTH.

Osqledaren continues reporting during periods between magazine releases: Online at osqledaren.se.

Statements appearing in the magazine should be, unless otherwise indicated, regarded purely as the opinions of Osqledaren.

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OSQLEDAREN #4

Corrections

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Editorial Deadline

The editorial deadline for OL#4 was 9 May 2023.

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This edition of Osqledaren was sent to print on 17 May 2023.

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Tekniska Högskolans Studentkår 114 28 Stockholm

Produced with love  in Nymble at KTH Valhallavägen

Student Journalism is Still Alive!

Throughout this year, one question about Osqledaren has concerned me more than anything else: why do we even print 10 000 of these magazines? Why do we need student journalism in this form?

I still don't have a final answer. What I do know, is this: student journalism is still alive. In Stockholm, with Osqledaren, #studietid, Kanalen (K), dbuggen (D), Index (I), Esset (S), Emissionen (E), The Force (F), Slurpen (IsF), many more I am forgetting (sorry!). In Uppsala with Ergo & Techna, in Linköping with LiTHanian, in Lund with Lundagård, in Göteborg with Spionen & Tofsen.

Some of us are celebrating anniversaries - Lundagård celebrated 100 years this March, Osqledaren will (if you include our predecessor Kårbladet) turn 80 in 2024. Others are new or rising from the deaddbuggen just printed their first edition in several years, the new Index was released just a few weeks ago, Emissionen has a new editor-in-chief, others will follow.

In a time where we can reach people across the globe in seconds, a printed magazine from the chapter hall next door feels counterintuitive, but I hope that at least some understand the charm in that. They are both ancestors and an extension to the KTH-memes and Legends of Tâmorrow, Facebook groups, Jodel channels and Discord servers of today - and even more. They can be an expression of creativity that is not based around pressing on a screen, adding bunny ears to a video or sending memes around, but it allows us to put our thoughts, ideas and dreams onto paper, into something physical and real that will endure.

That's not something that many university programs allow us to do. Everytime I grab a random magazine from Osqledaren's

archive, I'm surprised at how the ink has survived the last 30, 40 or 50 years, how it feels like it could've been written and printed yesterday. And how urgent and relevant the topics still seem. Should our student union be political? What is KTH trying to change about our education this year? Which part of Nymble is being renovated this time?

We often go around in circles in the student world and discuss the same things over and over, so it's worth looking back and learning from, but also admiring the minds of past decades. It can help us be inspired and learn what to do with our future.

This will be my last Osqledaren, but it will for sure not be the last OL. We will change, as will all the other student magazines around Sweden - but we will still be here in another 20 years for our 100th birthday, as long as there are still students that want to create, express, criticize, ask questions, change. And inspire others to do the same.

TEXT CHEFREDAKTÖR | EDITOR IN CHIEF, BENJAMIN JAVITZ

EXAMENSRINGAR

Hos oss köper du KTH originalringar

Vi har tillverkat examensringar i mer än 100 år. I vår verkstad gör erfarna guldsmeder din ring på gammeldags hantverkssätt.

Nu finns också prover på alla KTHs examensringar i kårexpeditionen i Nymble!

Vi bjuder på gravyren!

Sandberg

Nybrogatan 9, Stockholm

08-679 90 20, www.examensring.com

mån-fred 11-18, lördag 11-16

SAMHÄLLE

KTH - där dina forskningsdrömmar dör och återuppstår 6

Crossing the Border 10

So You Want to Focu... Wait, What? 12

Climbing the Chasm 14

kULTUR

Storslagen studentfest på Stockholms gator 16

Dekisflytten - Framtiden för spexen på KTH 20

OL GRÄVER

The Politics of Studentship 22

OL granskar igen: Nymble Restaurang 26

Studisabilities at KTH 30

UNDERHÅLLNING

The Great Summer Escape 32 Chasing Boredom With Snails 37 Learning From the 1 in a Millions 38 Resan till Kista 39

PÅ CAMPUS

What's Next for Nymble? 40

Don't Expect the Worst - Vol. 2 44

Hej THS, vad gör ni egentligen? /Osqledaren 46

Hej då, Presidium! 48

SLÄPP IN OSS! 49

Tack, Sven! 51

SAMHÄLLE

KTH - där dina forskningsdrömmar dör och återuppstår

Du kommer till föreläsningen och sätter dig ner, redo för att lägga de kommande två timmarna på att lära dig abstrakta förhållanden kring saker du inte ser användningen för. Såhär föreställde du dig aldrig att det skulle kännas när du sökte till KTH. Hur kunde det bli såhär?

TEXT LAURA NILSSON & GUNNAR ÅKERLIND FOTO ROISIN CALLAGHAN & ESTER

SAMHÄLLE KTH - DÄR DINA FORSKNINGSDRÖMMAR DÖR OCH ÅTERUPPSTÅR

När jag kom till KTH var jag inspirerad och taggad efter en gymnasietid med passionerade lärare. Jag var redo att ge mig in på riktigt i den akademiska världen, avsätta åtminstone fem hela år av mitt liv och ta till mig information för att kunna lösa de problem vi möts av idag. Men energin jag hade upplevt och de förväntningar som hade byggts upp raserades snabbt när jag kom till KTH. Jag mötte total blasé och en linalg-föreläsare som skyndade sig igenom slidesen för att kunna ta en fikapaus. Och vad var ens syftet med alla timmar jag spenderade på att lära mig linjära transformationer? Det fanns inte på kartan hur det skulle vara användbart. Jag började tro att det som jag var så passionerad över, det

Föreläsarna och kurserna svek mig, men det gjorde inte studenterna. De som satt längst fram och ställde utmanande frågor till föreläsarna. De ambitiösa studenterna som var amanuenser, men som man också såg i sektionslokalen. Det kryllar av spännande, intressanta och framförallt passionerade studenter på campus. Konversationer med dessa har inspirerat mig mer än någon föreläsare någonsin gjort.

Liksom för många andra studenter väcktes mitt intresse för mitt fält genom föreningen Unga Forskare, där jag genom mitt jobb fick träffa på inspirerande forskare och studenter som visade upp en mycket mer färgglad bild av hur en riktig passion

Det finns så otroligt många möjligheter. Jag blev speciellt inspirerad när fysikstudenten Simon Thor berättade om hur han blev involverad i forskning redan på gymnasiet. Han tog kontakt med en rymdfysikforskare på KTH och hjälpte till att skriva lite Python-kod. Idag är han medförfattare till två publikationer utan att ens ha hunnit ta examen. Efter att Simon insåg att det finns så otroligt mycket man kan göra som student och att forskare är väldigt hjälpsamma, grundade han EStER (Engineering Students Exploring Research).

Syftet med EStER är att fånga upp forskningsintresserade studenter – som mig –innan vi tappar allt intresse. En viktig del

rander och forskare som inspirerar, studiebesök i forskningsmiljöer, och genom att träffa andra forskningsintresserade studenter.

Men en forskningsförening är bara en bit i pusslet. Det finns flera förbättringsområden för att möjliggöra forskande studenter. Personer som faktiskt tycker om att undervisa och hålla sina kurser är någonting som inspirerat många i gymnasiet. På KTH finns kurser på grundnivå som hålls av överkvalificerade professorer som egentligen vill ägna sig åt sin egen forskning. De har sina scheman fullpackade och nedprioriterar kursen – och studenterna gör sedan likadant.

En förklaring till varför kursen är viktig saknas ofta. Varför ska jag förstå detta innehåll? Stort fokus läggs vid betygsgränser. Behöver jag klara den här kursen för att det är en spärrkurs? Alternativt blir det abstrakta formler som jag memorerar inför tentan. Vi vill veta varför vi ska lära oss innehållet – varför det är intressant och viktigt.

När man väl väckt intresset hos studenterna är nästa steg att utforska det genom att göra som Simon gjorde. Det finns mö-

jlighet för fler än Simon att forska innan man har börjat doktorera, men det är tyvärr väldigt få som vet det här på KTH, vilket är en av de saker vi vill förändra med EStER.

Om du vill bli forskningsamanuens måste du antingen våga fråga någon forskare som (så vitt du vet) inte har någon tid för dig eller leta under “lediga jobb” på intranätet där det någon gång ibland dyker upp en möjlighet till att delta i forskning under kandidaten.

Andra universitet i världsklass har forskningsmöjligheter för studenter. Det handlar

om en kulturell skillnad. Att bedriva så kallad undergraduate research är helt enkelt inte normen i Sverige. Att KTH inte har resurser till stora program som på MIT eller Stanford är förståeligt, men de bör i alla fall kunna marknadsföra sina amanuenstjänster likt amerikanska universitet. Den enda reklamen för forskning som jag har sett var i AlbaNova – och det var inte ens KTHs reklam.

Det ligger inte bara i studenters, utan även i KTHs intresse, att kunna prova på forskning tidigt. Att ta vara på potentialen hos studenter som hade planerat att jobba i industrin eller helt tänkt att hoppa av utbildningen. Det handlar om självförverkligande, samtidigt som KTH kan ligga i framkanten av forskning när världens utmaningar ska tacklas. Det är för studenters, KTHs och världens bästa att studenter får prova på att forska.

När jag kom till KTH var jag inspirerad, och tack vare de människor jag har träffat lär jag lämna KTH med samma passion som jag hade i början av mottagningen. Efter några år på KTH vet jag att det finns otroligt passionerade studenter och föreläsare här. Idag vet jag att matriser kan representera alla tänkbara fysiska system och inte bara abstrakta matematiska förhållanden. Men fler studenter känner som jag gjorde under mitt första år. Därför vill jag som har lyckats återuppliva min glöd se till att den inte slocknar för dem som precis har börjat på KTH och visa dem de möjligheter jag själv aldrig kände till.

Crossing the Border

From Syria to Turkey on foot, across the Mediterranean and the Aegean to Greece on a raft, on the back of a truck all the way from Hungary to Vienna, and somehow ending up on a train to Malmö... You’ve heard it before, at least that’s what you think. But this story isn’t meant to be a magnet for your empathy - and definitely not your pity either.

The year is 2007. You’re studying your third year of bachelor’s, trying to find your passion. You take a course in Embedded Systems and it suddenly strikes you - this is it, this is your passion. This is the future. KTH has the perfect program for you! And suddenly, you see it all: your masters’ thesis, your first job, all the things you’re going to revolutionize about the tech world.

This is how your academic journey begins… Except that you’re not Karl from Gävle, you’re Ahmad from Aleppo. But you’re just another student, in just another university, with the same ambition, some anxiety, some free-time... The usual, really. Nothing special.

I met Ahmad during my first month in Sweden, right after he finished giving a speech during KTH’s ceremony for scholarship recipients. Guilty as you may feel in these situations, I was also moved by empathy. I felt intrigued, touched, compassionate… inspired, maybe; a little bit sorry. All of the beautiful adjectives we use to mask pity. Despite my home country neighboring his, and my mother tongue matching his; not once did I think: relatable. 19 months later, I called Ahmad for an interview. I wanted to rid myself, before any of you, from the so-called empathy that strips us from our ability to see other people as ‘similar’.

Ahmad Zaklouta, KTH Alumni and FPGA consultant, is an example of someone who dug his way into the classroom. Like many of us, he had set his mind to pursue his masters degree at KTH midway through

his bachelor’s, right after taking a course on embedded systems. For him, however, things were a little bit more complicated.

While your average Karl from Gävle can express a political opinion the same way they complain about the weather; the average Ahmad from Aleppo cannot. An anti-government opinion that 21-year old Ahmad spurted out on campus cost him 4 years of his life. Vocal students at the time were mass-imprisoned; which led to him being behind bars during the elections’ period in Syria. Unfortunately for him, the date of his release from jail coincided with the start of the war. Being a political prisoner stripped Ahmad of all his civil rights, including access to his personal identification documents - but it did not strip him of his dream to make it to KTH.

And so he fled, clueless and undocumented, to Turkey; where he would spend a couple of years attempting to work and save up, researching routes and planning his life-threatening journey across the Mediterranean. With nothing to lose and just over €4,000 in savings, he hopped on a raft with 5 dozen people heading to Greece in August of 2015.

On foot through Turkey, on a raft to Greece, by bus through Macedonia, across the border to Serbia, smuggled on a truck from Hungary to Vienna, up on a train through Germany - Ahmad saw only one light at the end of the tunnel: to get to KTH in one piece.

After a journey of 28 days across 8 borders, Ahmad finally arrived in Malmö and turned himself into Migrationsverket (Swedish Migration Agency). Afterwards, he was allocated to a shelter in Flen, a town southeast of Stockholm, where he awaited his acceptance letter from KTH.

Ahmad’s story is not meant to inspire you in any way, it’s not meant to trigger you either. It’s not meant to normalize smuggling, it’s not meant to normalize war. It’s meant to neither idolize nor dehumanize refugees; it’s just meant to show you that they are not a different species.

Ahmad is not any different from the millions of refugees spread out across the world; quoting his own words, many are probably much smarter than him and possess much more potential. We live in a time where many companies, universities, and even governments are pushing for diversity, inclusion and intercultural exchanges are valued and celebrated; yet we still manage to exclude those who need to be included the most.

Upon being granted refugee status in Sweden, refugees are often introduced to a 2-year integration program. Which is not necessarily bad; it’s just not designed to empower. It provides you with the bare minimum of language and survival skills to make it through. Sounds fair, right? Sure.

Now put yourself in those shoes. You graduated as an engineer after studying for five years, you may even have a year or

two of experience. Then suddenly, you’re expected to stagnate for two years. You’re expected to learn a few phrases in a foreign language - just enough to help you settle for a vocational job. And that’s where you stay - there’s no moving up.

The alternative to that is that, like Ahmad, you’re given the chance to enroll in a university, pursue - or continue pursuing - an education. Integrate in the meantime. Get to know the society around you, maybe even the language. Accustom yourself to the culture, to the traditions. Make friends, build your confidence. Build a solid ground

for a career, a ground solid enough that you don’t feel forced into stagnation or reliance… a ground solid enough that you yourself become a contributor to society, you give more than you take.

What makes the story of Ahmad different has less to do with his luck, ambition, or perseverance; and much more to do with systematic support and opportunity. What helped Ahmad get to where he is today is not that he is immune to trauma; it’s that he received the support that he needed. The humanitarian scholarship that he received from “KTH Alumni” allowed him to move

on with his education justly, and receive the support and the equipment he needed to match his colleagues. By receiving that kind of support, Ahmad was also able to integrate within Swedish student life sustainably - he made a lot of friends, tried out winter sports, got into skiing, and even found a job through THS Armada.

In every refugee camp, shelter, or integration program there is at least one young person who can be of great contribution to society; and it’s up to the systems we create whether they end up next to us in a classroom or on the streets.

So You Want to Focu... Wait, What?

While writing the title, I checked Instagram twice, spent 15 minutes texting my friend, and stared blankly at my screen for way longer than I’d like to admit. When it comes to productivity, focus is everything. We want to be able to finish our tasks quickly. We want to be able to complete the projects we start. We want to be able to give our full attention to others. But focus is also difficult. How are we supposed to focus? What do we…um…yes, what do we do to focus?

Focus is an important thing. Whether it is for schoolwork, internships, or even working on our hobbies, being able to ‘get into the flow state’ and work productively ensures that we can finish what we need to do in the shortest amount of time possible.

But alas, focus is a hard thing to achieve (I just checked both my email and Instagram (again) while writing this introduction). According to research, it was found that Millennials and Gen-Zs unlock their phones upwards of 60 times per day (working out to 3.75 times an hour if we sleep 8 hours a day). And since it takes an average of 23 minutes and 15 seconds for us to regain focus after each distraction, we’re spending A LOT of our time not focusing on the tasks at hand.

But, how are we supposed to focus? Is there a secret button to press somewhere? Do we just have to tell ourselves to get into the zone? To find out the answer, I asked around to find out the different focus techniques that are being used:

Benjamin Javitz, Chefredaktör på OL: “I use good noise canceling headphones especially if there are many people around. I also take breaks because I’ve heard that

you can’t focus for more than 45-50 minutes at a go. Take a 10-minute break and go somewhere to clear your mind”

Carlos Casanueva, Associate Professor: “It depends on the task and activity — meetings, group work, course development, and other collective activities do not typically require me to explicitly focus; others like extensive reading and writing require me to reserve a longer chunk of time (I try to use “time blocking” for 1.5 hours or more) and have lo-fi beats or brown noise in the background. Sometimes I throw the smartphone into the backpack or to another room to avoid getting distracted.”

Sarabjot Kaur, Nuclear Physicist: “Break bigger tasks into smaller ones and enjoy the small wins every day. For me, one major reason for my focus fading away is my anxiousness about what the future holds. So, I create lists of pending tasks at the beginning of the day and try to complete as many as I can.

Yuki Okamoto, exchange student from Tokyo: “I can’t concentrate in noisy places, or even when I am around my friends. As such, I often go to the silent room in the library to study. At the same time, I also find that

massaging the acupuncture points on my hands helps me stay awake and ready to focus.”

Okay, those were some very good tips for focusing while studying and doing homework. What about attending a lecture or a seminar? What can we do to ensure that we don’t end up distracted in class? Professor Joseph Siegel of Stockholm University (who has studied classroom interactions, practices, and language teaching pedagogy) has given us 3 tips that might be able to help:

“a) work and reward: promise yourself some rewards (a coffee, some net surfing time, etc.) if you stay focused for the entire class but try to avoid "rewarding" yourself during study time/lectures.

b) prepare and predict: do all pre-lecture reading so you are familiar with relevant terms and material. Then you can see during the lecture where the teacher is covering "familiar" ground and where they are introducing new material. Especially for the new material, you'd likely want to take notes. Also, predict. As the teacher is speaking, actively guess what they will say next. This could be the word, phrase, sentence, or longer section length. Our brains are always predicting upcoming language input based on patterns we've heard before. By actively and consciously doing this, listeners will be more focused on the speaker.

c) take it all in: Teachers never feel they have enough time with students, so they make many conscious choices of what to say, share, include, and show during lessons. Students should be aware and try to draw out / milk each piece of input for as much information and meaning as possible. In addition, students should use their attention to look for links and connections between these different sources of multimodal input.”

Basically, if you want to focus in class, one of the key things that you have to do is to remain engaged. I know, we’ve all been there. We tell ourselves “Hey, you know what, we’ve seen that particular slide before, I’ll just take a quick peek at my Instagram feed”. Before you know it, it’s the end of class and you haven’t stopped looking at social media.

Okay, but that’s the listening side of things. What if we want to capture the attention of others? What if we are presenting and we want other people to focus on what we are saying? Are there any special presentation styles that we can use to encourage others to focus? Prof Siegel shares 4 (+ 1 bonus!) tips with us:

“a) Use voice qualities to attract the listener's attention. This means varying pitch, speed, word stress, etc. Use pauses effectively, especially if one has said something that might take time to process. Say the complicated point. Pause and let it sink in before moving on.

b) Rephrase. Use signposts like "In other words", "To put it another way", etc. These signal to the listener that they are about to hear an "easier" or more accessible version of a potentially complicated idea. These signals also show the listener that they are essentially hearing the same idea twice, which means it is an important one.

c) Use signposts in general; for example, First, Next, Another main point, The last thing I want to talk about...etc. These add structure and clarity to speech and also help the listener understand the organization.

d) provide some kind of comprehension check ("Are you with me?", "Know what I mean?") and look for physical signs of comprehension / non-comprehension (facial expressions, sighs, etc.)

I would also add that it can be helpful to do/say something somewhat unpredictable to get/keep the audience's attention. I don't mean crazy or silly but something that keeps to the main point but is deliv ered in a memorable way.”

But as with every journey, we don’t only spend time doing work and presenting. Sometimes, we have projects (both aca demic and fun) to work on. How can we stay focused on these? To find out, I in terviewed Carlos Casanueva, Associate Professor in Rail Vehicles and Program Re sponsible for the 5-year Vehicle Engineer ing program (Farkostteknik CivEng). Be fore answering the questions, Carlos also

stressed that because he is ADHD-inattentive, he has challenges with organizing his work, focusing on certain tasks, and having a good long-term understanding of the projects. As such, his perspective might not apply to everyone.

“[Project management] is arguably one of the most difficult skills to master. Different projects require different focus at different times, so to have a person specifically in charge of project management (and nothing more) would be the best option so that the personnel, time, and resources are distributed properly. This is possible for bigger companies but not for students or universities though…

My approach here is to write a weekly review of my work where I go through my notes and recall the coming deadlines, the running tasks (tasks with no real deadline or periodicity like courses), what was done, what was not (and from that what is important or can be pushed or delegated). I use a simplified bullet journalling technique for my notes where I only have one “journal” where I write work-related stuff, then every week I “restart” or “process” everything from the previous week (so I only have one week of pages or activities to look back). It takes some time but is a good investment for me.”

Of course, focus isn’t easy and sometimes, we will find ourselves distracted. Carlos shared that “the one specific activity that I find challenging is keeping focus while processing emails and keeping my mailbox in check – it needs both a proactive and reactive attitude. Some emails can be processed in a minute while others require more work – here the focus can shift quite a lot, and my brain can start losing focus and jump from mail chain to mail chain with the risk of forgetting what I was doing.”. And I think, at the end of the day, it is important for us to recognize that we aren’t all robots that can continually focus all day. Some of us will find different tasks challenging to focus on while other tasks will bring us into the ‘flow’ instantly. All we can do is

And now, if you are still focusing and reading this(!), I want to reward you before you go…by giving you even more to read! As I went around knocking heads, I also asked another question: what works will you recommend others to read in order to their improve focus?

Benjamin: Thinking Fast and Slow — a very detailed book about human psychology and the two systems in your brain. I think there were a few things about focus in the book.

Professor Joseph Siegel: For presentation styles, there is a great book — Presentation Zen by Garr Renolds. Otherwise, Developing Notetaking in a Second Language by Joseph Siegel and the article “Academic Listening and Lecture Notetaking for Ll/L2 Students: The Need to Investigate the Utility of the Axioms of Good Notetaking” by Patricia A. Dunkel (1988). There are likely more technical works on attention, etc. but I'd say these three are more accessible to students than more research-type works.

Carlos Casanueva: For books about how to organize things or time management-related topics, there is Getting Things Done by David Allen, a classic book that details a method to get things done. The method itself can be overcomplicated but it introduces some concepts that one can adapt to their routines for keeping the work on track, especially when there are different courses or projects to track or work with. Another book is Drive by Daniel Pink — it provides great insight on how to motivate people and talks about what drives us (which helps with focusing!)

And from me: Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams by Matthew Walker — while this is not a book about focus per se, this book highlights why sleep is important for us and how getting enough sleep is key to allowing us to learn and focus. Especially as students that probably don’t get enough sleep, this book will help you realize the importance of sleep, and by association, improve

Climbing the Chasm

You’ve been studying for all your life. What comes next? For those of you that feel a sense of dread and being lost when reading that question, I’d like to share my journey of how I started my professional life and give some advice in an effort to inspire you to start “climbing the

With every second ticking away on the clock, the pressure builds, slowly but steadily. For many of us, the studies we’re currently in are going to be the last step in our formal education. And that is going to be over much sooner than we think. A huge part of our lives is going to get ripped out and replaced by… what? What happens then?

For some of us, the answer is clear, and they are looking forward eagerly to their life after their studies, merrily going their way to score their dream job, become fulltime academics or travel to different places in the world. But for some of us, this is a staggered nightmare. Having spent all their lifetime up until now in education, figuring out what to do with their lives can be daunting.

It’s easy to feel unprepared, to feel lost. You’re drifting on an endless sea of possibilities, but without prior experiences, you’ve got nothing to hold on to; no anchor, no safe haven. You’re on your own. I was at that point once, too. For me, it felt more like being trapped in a deep, dark hole – a chasm, if you will. I felt like I had nowhere to go and was afraid to take the first step. I did not see the possibilities.

Nowadays though, I have years of work experience on my hands and I’m pretty much brimming with confidence and clarity about my career. What’s changed? Where did that confidence come from?

It started on a summer night in the fourth semester of my bachelor’s, and I was in quite a terrible mood. You see, at that point I was already going through a really rough patch for various reasons, and it didn’t help to know what was just around the corner. My previous university had a mandatory internship semester and that was coming up. It would be the first time we’d be thrown out into the “real life”without much guidance. Not only did I not know how to do a good application or how to go through all the formalities, I didn’t even know what I wanted to do.

Sure, I had been programming for quite a while, but was it truly my calling as a job? Many job listings sounded very dull at first glance. Also, would my abilities even hold up in a professional setting? I’d never used many of the fancy enterprise frameworks they talked about. It seemed like you needed experience to get experience, some weird catch-22. Just looking at those advertisements was enough to have impostor syndrome kick in. “Who would even take me?”, I thought.

At first, I only wrote one single application, and in the most uninspired way. I just wrote it to the engineering subdivision of one of the largest companies in the region I lived in. But large companies move very sluggishly, so the months would drag on without a reply and the pressure would continue to build.

I didn’t bother to do more. I was still stuck not knowing what to do, and even more so, I was terrified of actually getting a positive reply and being invited to interviews. Those were made out to be such a big deal by teachers in school, that it was hard to imagine myself surviving that situation.

I had all these scenarios play out in my head, trying to figure out what to answer to all the typical, terribly superficial questions, but that proved to be quite hard. Just imagine the audacity – “where do you see yourself in five years?”. I don’t even know what I’m going to have for breakfast tomorrow!

It also didn’t help that over time, more and more of my peers were starting to report their successes in finding a spot. I grew more and more nervous because I was starting to fall behind.

It was on the aforementioned summer night in my fourth semester that I broke through this paralysis. I had just gotten home from attending a concert, with some adrenaline still pumping in my veins. The dread started setting in again as soon as I arrived home, because once again I had to face the unfinished business of caring for my future.

I made a decision. Just to shut up my bad conscience and to be able to say “I tried”, it was now time to force myself to write two more applications to some random smaller

chasm”.

denly, I was now in the luxury of being the one who chooses. This was a huge confidence boost, and finally gave me some much needed validation for the path I had chosen to walk in my life.

In the end, I chose the smallest of the three companies, that I’d previously considered the least. To my surprise, what they did was actually much more interesting once you get to see it in person, and they gave me an offer that blew all the others out of the water and exceeded all expectations someone with a mandatory internship could have had.

The main lesson here is that you should never lose hope. Yes, the first steps towards your career are quite scary ones to take. But once you get out of paralysis, once you start climbing out of the chasm, good things can happen.

To those of you that still feel lost, I want to leave you with some advice that I learned through those years:

Don’t sell yourself short, and don’t get intimidated by a “lack of skill”. No matter what it says on the job listing, every

entry-level job has some kind of learning period to get you comfortable. The most important thing is to show that you can improve. Ask yourself, who would you yourself rather hire: Someone who can do one thing well forever but never learn new things, or someone who needs some buildup time but can always adapt?

Experiment and play around. Life is really not that serious. Just try out some things and see what happens. I wrote an application that – to me – seemed whimsical at best, but it got me some great years of experience. If nothing else, taking this stuff less seriously can also help you learn to deal with rejection.

Seek out things that make you uncomfortable. You might have heard that one already. But it’s true. A certain level of external stress is necessary for us to grow as people.

Give small, local companies a chance. Some of us think the only way to have a meaningful career is to work for the “big names”, as I did – “go big or go home”. But that is NOT necessarily true. You might get surprised by what else you might find.

Build some skills outside university or do internships. School gives you one point of view of things. There are more out there. Life often differs from theory. If it’s possible in your field, do projects on your own, build a portfolio, get some practice in. This will help with applications, but more so, with your confidence.

There is no master plan. You don’t need to have it all figured out yet, and certainly you shouldn’t feel bad for not having done so. Unexpected things happen all the time, and the more you learn to take advantage of “going with the flow”, the more resilient you will be to them.

And most importantly.

Never, ever, “lie down to die”. From someone who’s experienced the dread of feeling lost, hear me out: You WILL make it.

Storslagen studentfest på Stockholms gator

En vecka i maj intar studenter iklädda regnbågens alla färger Valhallavägen för att delta i Norra Europas största studentevenemang. Det svetsas, hamras, målas, och kvällarna spenderas i öltältet eller på SM-i-fest. Den stora finalen är den 13 maj, då 32 ekipage tågar längs Stockholms gator. Det här är Quarnevalen 2023.

TEXT ALEXANDRA ANDERSSON FOTO ANNA PAVLIASHVILI & ANASTASIA ANGELI & BENJAMIN JAVITZ

Vårt lag

Sophie Dellmark, Quarnevalens general

“Mortal Maskineriet”/Mortal Engineers

“Finskt kärnvapen” (Arkitektursektionen med mera)

Tâm Vũ, jurymedlem

"Teknologhjulet" (THS Kårstyrelsen med mera)

OSQLEDAREN #4

Det är sex år sedan sist, på grund av ett pandemi-uppehåll, och därför känns det extra högtidligt när Valhallavägen mellan Stadion och KTH förvandlas till Quarnevalens byggplats en vecka i maj. Här ska över 500 studenter i 32 bygglag skapa de ekipage som ska tåga genom centrala Stockholm.

Under byggveckan blir vädret bara bättre och bättre för att framåt helgen nå sitt crescendo. Vi böjer hönsnät tills fingrarna blöder och gör papier-maché av tidningar tills händerna blir svarta, stämningen på SM-i-fest-sittningarna skjuter i taket och på kvällarna somnar man ovaggad med bygglåtens tra-la-la, tweedeledeedee, kom hit om du vill ringandes i huvudet.

I vårt lag är vi 24 studenter från fyra sektioner på KTH samt Stockholms universitet och Karolinska Institutet. Alla känner någon sedan innan, men ingen känner alla. Medan vi sågar, klistrar och målar lär kemisterna samhällsbyggarna och fysikerna om bakterieceller, vi jämför sektionernas traditioner och mot slutet av veckan grupperar vi oss inte längre utifrån färg på ovvebenen. Det är en speciell gemenskap som uppstår när man för en vecka lägger skolallvaret åt sidan för att hänge sig åt något som plockar ut de bästa delarna av studentlivet.

Har du någon favorit bland bidragen?

– Jag gillar generellt de som är mer riktade till barn; Flygare Bob är väldigt populär. Jag älskar också M20 och Ölhäveriets bidrag då de verkligen visar de ingenjörsmässiga aspekterna.

Bidraget som tveklöst tar mest plats på byggplatsen är “Mortal Maskineriet” med nummer 15 och två SL-bussar:

– Vi snackade med Keolis och sa att vi skulle vilja ha bussar, och de sa: “hur många?”, berättar Viktor Dyrvold, quapten i laget som består av 31 studenter från bland annat Maskinsektionen.

Vad bygger ni?

– Det är baserat på en bokserie från 80-talet och en film från 2018 – Mortal Enginees. Det är en postapokalyptisk uppsättning där städer äter upp varandra, och vi bygger Stockholm.

Har det gått som väntat?

– Det är svårt att veta hur det ska gå när man har en buss som man inte vet hur den funkar innan man ser den. Från början hade vi till exempel tänkt ta av hela taket och bygga om på båda bussarna, men så blev det inte.

Vad är det bästa med Quarnevalen?

Har allt gått som planerat?

– Vi har inte kunnat vara här så jättemycket i veckan då vi haft jättemycket plugg, säger Julia Nordlöf. Men nu är det finliret vi håller på med.

Vad är det bästa med Quarnevalen?

– Gemenskapen, laget! Jag har typ inte ens rört mig utanför den här rutan.

Dagen Q. Det är lördag den 13 maj och från tidig morgon görs de sista förberedelserna. Alla ekipage transporteras från byggplatsen upp till KTH, gator spärras av och juryn installerar sig vid Handelshögskolan. En av jurymedlemmarna är Tâm Vũ, känd som övningsassistent och grundare till Facebook-gruppen Legends of Tâmorrow.

Hur kommer det sig att du sitter i juryn?

– Jag har ingen aning, men Sophie (Quarnevalens general reds. anm.) bjöd in mig. Jag antar att jag är med för att de flesta studenter känner till mig.

Vad har du för förväntningar?

Fredag den 12 maj. Dagen före Dagen Q. Stämningen på byggplatsen är förvånansvärt lugn trots att det bara är ett par timmar kvar tills det är slutbyggt. I vimlet av ovvar och frackar hittar vi Sophie Dellmark, Quarnevalens general:

Hur är känslorna inför morgondagen?

– Jag är jättetaggad, men jättenervös.

Har veckan gått som du väntade dig?

– Jag kunde inte vänta mig att det skulle bli så här bra i och med att det är en nystart. Men det har varit så bra uppslutning, och byggarna är så bra!

– Hela upplevelsen! Det har varit flera månader av att planera på papper och nu får man se det förverkligas. Och alla byggare har verkligen varit fantastiska.

På andra sidan byggplatsen bygger 22 studenter från Arkitektursektionen med mera bidraget “Finskt kärnvapen”. Det är Muminhuset som raket; en idé som delvis kom till i och med Sveriges och Finlands Natoansökningar som präglat den senaste tidens nyhetsrapportering.

– Vi ville göra något lite satiriskt, säger Ivar Svensson.

– Jag har väldigt höga förväntningar trots att jag aldrig varit med förut. Allt ser väldigt imponerande ut och det är väldigt kreativa lösningar.

Klockan 14.08 smäller det. Eller, det är planen, men det är inte förrän klockan 14.39 som klartecken ges och Konglig Amiralitetet skjuter startskottet varpå tåget börjar sin färd nedför Drottning Kristinas väg. Valhallavägen, Odengatan, Sveavägen, Kungsgatan och Sturegatan lyder rutten som tar ekipagen förbi en enorm publik och tillbaka till byggplatsen för snabbast möjliga rivning innan det bär av mot slutfest. Och så är det tre år kvar tills Stockholms gator återigen kommer fyllas av storslagna ekipage som ger allmänheten en glimt av vad Stockholms studentliv innebär.

DekisflyttenFramtiden för spexen på KTH

påverkar spexen negativt, det går inte att skjuta under stolen.

Framtiden för spexen ser däremot inte så mörk ut som man kan tro. Samarbete och laganda genomsyrar diskussionerna och många är lösningsorienterade för att få det att fungera. Ingen är stoltare än jag över arbetet spexen gör i frågan. Läs mer för att få reda på mer om Dekisflytten!

Halloj! Jag heter Emil och är Studiesocialt ansvarig på THS. Jag arbetar med Studiesociala frågor, det vill säga pubar, sektioner, sektionslokaler, utbildningar och spex. På KTH har vi totalt 11 spex, men ett av dem är dock inaktivt. Mitt spex-ursprung kommer från Dubbelspexet, vilket är ett gemensamt spex mellan CL och W. Det finns även flera andra spex: Bergsspexet, Fysikalen, iSpexet, Jubelspexet, Kårspexet, Krexet, KVSIF och METAspexet. Det nyaste tillskottet är English Theatre Club som är THS första engelsktalande spex. Det är superviktigt och kul att vi har ett engelsktalande spex så att alla internationella studenter har en möjlighet att uppleva spexkulturen vi har på KTH. Sedan har vi även Elogen som tyvärr är inaktivt sedan 2020, men vi hoppas att de är tillbaka snart igen.

Dekis är spexförrådet alla spexen under THS kan nyttja. Vi fick tillträde till Dekis 2014 under premissen att lösningen inte var permanent. Det var en lokal vi kunde nyttja efter att Dekis flyttade från Kräftriket. Det är alltså inte första och förmodligen inte sista gången vi gör en Dekisflytt. Den här gången har KTH däremot sagt att detta är en långvarig lösning. KTH-lokaler är dock aldrig en självklarhet och varken studenter eller KTH-personal kan se in i framtiden.

Dekis är uppdelat i 2 användningsområden. Ett av användningsområdena är förvaring av all rekvisita, kulisser och allt annat material spexen använder till sina föreställningar. Det andra användningsområdet är byggyta. Spexen behöver ganska stor byggyta för att kunna göra sina projekt. Många spex har många personer som är med i bygglagen och Dekis är en av THS mest brukade yta för studiesociala aktiviteter. Varje dag i veckan är det folk som bygger i Dekis.

Diskussionen om flytten började under min företrädare Hanna Bjarres tid. Diskussionen kring Dekisflytten diskuterades samtidigt som den omtalade sektionslokalsflytten. Sektionslokalsflytten är pausad

och som det ser ut nu kommer den inte att återupptas på lång tid. Dekisflytten är däremot ett krav eftersom KTH behöver nyttja Dekis som central miljöstation. Eftersom KTH behöver anpassa sig till nya miljölagar behöver flytten ske så fort som möjligt. Vi bad om att få göra flytten under sommaren för att studenterna inte ska behöva hantera flytten under studietid. En flytt kräver mycket tid och samordning mellan KTH, THS centralt och spexen. Det är många aktörer som ska medverka och skulle flytten ske under vanliga studieperioder hade det gått ut över studierna. Spexen har även önskat

måste göra sig av med väldigt mycket av sitt material. Under maj månad och under början av flyttperioden kommer spexen ha möjlighet att slänga gammalt bråte. I genomsnitt planerar spexen att göra sig av med 60 procent av sitt material.

Problemen med nya Dekis är flera. Det saknas för tillfället toalett, takhöjden är låg, ytan är mycket mindre, ventilationen är dålig, det är kallt i lokalen, väggarna är dåliga och så vidare. KTH prioriterar däremot det här projektet högt och mycket av det kommer att lösa sig. Förvaringsytan är däremot tajt, men spexen har ett starkt samarbete vilket gör att man kommer att kunna dela på och effektivisera förvaringsytan. Jag är stolt över deras lösningsorienterade inställning och jag är helt säker på att de kommer att göra det här otroligt bra. Det är tydligt att det är ett mer utökat samarbete än tidigare och förslag som att dela på material och verktyg samt andra samarbeten diskuteras. De kommer även upprätta kontinuerliga möten för att hantera nya Dekis smidigare än det gamla Dekis.

det eftersom det är många föreställningar och byggande i Dekis under vanliga studieperioder.

I dagsläget håller KTH på att tömma nya Dekis på material och renoverar lokalen för att den ska vara brukbar för oss. Nya Dekis ligger i Sing-sing med entré mot Kemigården. I juni kommer vi sedan flytta allt material. KTH betalar för allt, men studenterna hjälper till att flytta sina grejer så att de kan få med sig materialet de vill behålla.

Den nya spexförrådslokalen refereras i dagsläget till som “nya Dekis”, men spexen håller på att arbeta fram nya namnförslag. Det nya Dekis har en avsevärt mycket mindre yta än gamla Dekis. Vi hade otroligt tur som fick bruka en så stor lokal helt gratis. Gamla Dekis har en väldigt hög takhöjd och nya Dekis är mycket lägre. Det innebär att volymen minskar drastiskt och spexen

Något jag verkligen önskar från KTHs håll är att de löser toalettproblemet. De har sagt att det prioriteras, men inte gett mig ett definitivt besked. Dessutom önskar jag att spexen får tillgång till tomma lokaler för tillfällig förvaring utöver nya Dekis, på grund av de nuvarande planerna kring lokaler som sker just nu är detta däremot mer en dröm än något som kan realiseras inom en snar framtid.

I tider med ökade lokalkostnader och miljökrav behöver KTH sätta press på oss för att effektivisera de ytor vi får gratis från dem. KTH värdesätter spexen högt och nya Dekis är en kompromiss som gör att vi behåller funktionen av Dekis gratis samtidigt som KTH får tillgång till lokalen de behöver för att uppnå sina miljömål. Slutsatsen är dock tydlig: spexen har blivit serverade en bajsmacka, men de gör om den till en nutellasmörgås genom ett starkt och effektivt samarbete. Hatten av!

Dekisflytten

Nya Dekis

KULTUR DEKISFLYTTEN - FRAMTIDEN FÖR SPEXEN PÅ KTH

OL GRÄVER

The Politics of Studentship

‘Why do I have to care about politics? What does politics have to do with me? I’m not queer, black, a muslim, or a jew. I’m not a scientist, or a journalist or an artist. I’m not indigenous. I’m not old, I don’t pay tuition fees. I don’t rent, I don’t have to work, I don’t travel. I’m neither an international student, nor a minority. I’m not impacted by climate change, migration laws, import policies or global relations. Why should I care?’

All over history, students have always been a driving force of political change. Exactly 55 years ago, on May 24th, 1968, students in Stockholm left a mark on Swedish politics with the four-day occupation (Kårhusockupationen) of the student union building at Stockholm University. The occupation took place as a result of a debate surrounding the introduction of fixed study courses in Swedish higher education; and was likely inspired by the nation-wide civil unrest that happened in France as a result of student protests. Today, the student landscape at a majority of Swedish universities looks very different... While a small number of student unions, such as Stockholms universitets studentkår (SUS) are still heavily influenced by politics and led by party-affiliated students; our student union, THS, and most student unions in Sweden for that matter, often take a stance on a different end of the spectrum.

To some students, however, politics is less about the percentage of rightor left-leaning party representatives elected into their union; and more about the right to study, the right to live, the right to rent, the right to live sustainably, and the right to a secure future. While not all of us at KTH might relate to these rights, or comprehend the urgency of accommodating them, it is important to keep in mind that a significant

percentage of our students are impacted by decisions relating to tuition fees, sustainable choices, migration laws, rental policies, representation, and/or financial student aid.

2022 was a heavy year; the war in Ukraine, the Tigray conflict in Ethiopia, the protests in Iran, the ban on female education in Afghanistan, and so much more have left many students around the world in extremely vulnerable positions. For some international students already in Sweden, this

meant added distress and a lack of the ability to foresee a future in Sweden; but for those who are yet to arrive, global politics often hindered their opportunities to pursue higher education in Sweden. Is it not the student union’s responsibility to speak out when it comes to political issues that affect students?

Osqledaren spoke to Iranian PhD student and EECS council representative, Alireza Kamelabad, who continuously tried to reach out to THS over the past couple of years. Alireza had been very active in fighting for the rights of Iranian students in Sweden, during a time where obtaining a residence permit became almost impossible for Iranian students. With the Swedish migration agency taking over 6 months to process applications, and students not being able to apply any earlier than 3 months prior to their studies; many students lost the chance to arrive on time for their classes. While Alireza attempted to bring up the issue to THS, he often did not receive a response or acknowledgement of his concerns; which led to severe disappointment and a lack of trust in THS’s operations. Alireza summarizes his experience of the past 3 years, “It seems like THS is mainly occupied with planning parties, with their time and resources going into that instead of fo-

cusing on resolving issues or defending the rights of students”. His disappointment, perhaps similar to many impacted students out there, stems from an expectation put on the student union as a place for “scholars with fresh minds who guide society to a future that is beneficial for all”, instead, he has often felt like he would turn to THS if he wanted to throw a party; and not if he needed support.

Union board member (Kårstyrelsen, KS) and former union president, Teo Elmfeldt, describes the caution of THS when it comes to taking stances as an active attempt not to alienate the members: “It’s important to consider where we can be political without alienating our members, where politics become essential to protect students - which is very visible in the case of international students.” Teo references the natural variations in the opinions of the members; some might have stronger opinions than others with regards to the migration restrictions that Sweden should have, or with regards to CSN (governmental student aid) for example. However, he is of the opinion that THS should strive to be able to act when a decision involves an attack against its members; such as decisions that make life in Sweden more difficult for international students, or the Aliens Act which impacted PhD students’ ability to stay in Sweden. Teo describes such policies as ones that go against THS’s core values… but what is the difference between a policy that withholds a PhD student’s right to a permanent residency, and another that hinders a new student’s ability to even come to Sweden after receiving an acceptance to KTH?

The highest decision-making body of THS are its members, through the union council (Kårfullmäktige, KF) which consists of chapter representatives. However, those who are most impacted by global policies are widely underrepresented - if present at all - within the union council. Carl Housten, ex-Osqledaren Editor-in-Chief, former member of KF and current political secretary of SSCO (Stockholm Federation of Student Unions), elaborates on how little interest in external politics there is within THS’s decision-making bodies, the union council

(KF) and the union board (Kårstyrelse, KS). Carl believes that the organization is now stuck in a bad combination where the elected representatives are sometimes expected to be advocating for students rights within the realm of student politics, without this being mentioned in their job description. Though THS claims to be active in national politics impacting students through the broader unions, such as SFS (Sveriges förenade studentkårer, or Swedish National Union of Students), the reality is that the majority of members see none of that. It becomes very obvious, not just from our interviews, but also from conversations with students - even those active in chapters and in the union - how little students know about the higher-up organizations. Nonetheless, Carl also states that THS could - and should - be doing much more within the higher organizations. As one of the biggest student unions in Sweden, it becomes evident from our involvement in SFS but also from our list of priorities, that there is a lot of room for change.

Carl explains, “Organizations have different roles, students at KTH know what a chapter is - maybe what THS is. But if you talk to the politicians in power, or the industry, they know who SSCO & SFS are, but they don’t know who the individual unions are. The larger organizations have the opportunity to actually make change on the national level. THS writing a debate piece or a statement on their own won’t have that much impact, but if you join with the other unions, you get a bit more. You need to organize on a bigger scale to actually push questions through, but it’s also important for THS’s reputation that they address the issues that are important to their students even if they don’t expect to actually get those questions through themselves. Lead by example, even if you’re not going to meet the prime minister and discuss it yourself.“

THS seems to then be in a vicious cycle, where in order for the organization to be equipped enough to take action in political matters impacting its members, the organization must be steered towards that direction in its operational plan. However, with the ones who ultimately mandate the operational plan being the members of the union council (KF); the biggest question to raise here is: what resources are these representatives provided with in order to increase their ability to tackle the larger-scale influential questions that could define THS’s strategic work?

According to board member, Teo Elmfeldt, THS “does not elect people because of their strong political opinions and they are not being elected with that responsibility.“ They are ultimately elected because of their competence and opinions on student influence towards KTH and student life on campus. The union board in particular operates strategically and not operationally; meaning that even though they are tasked with the preparation of the operational plan, they can only advise the management team on what to focus on and prioritize. “It seems like we don’t have the correct framework to address these political issues when they arise”, says Teo, “it’s also hard to prioritize these questions when we don’t perceive the work:gain balance to be there. These questions consume a lot of time and we often cannot see immediate results, so by tackling political questions we would have to be down-prioritizing other student life questions. I’m not saying that THS always prioritizes correctly, I’m just saying that it is a matter of prioritization for good or for worse; and since we as elected representatives change on a yearly basis, it is always down to the specific representatives that hold these positions every year. We can of course write down documents detailing how and what should be done and what questions should be prioritized, but the reality is that political influence is quite a soft topic to communicate to our successors.”

“THS is a ‘political’ organization, but it’s not party-political,” adds Teo “THS should be able to act politically when needed.” Despite this claim, it still seems like it’s hard for THS to take any political stances. The fact that a student organization over 120 years old lacks established routines to support affected students is quite disappointing. If we didn’t have routines when tuition fees were introduced for international students in 2011, or during the 2015 refugee crisis, the Aliens act of 2021, war, and student permit complications; when do we begin to deem it necessary to establish routines? With the world around us changing so rapidly, it is more important now than ever that we as a student force as prepared to take informed and revolutionary stances with regards to the challenges around us; be it preparing to protect our students, establishing environmental-friendly patterns in the face of climate change, or pushing forward educational accessibility for all.

OL granskar igen: Nymble Restaurang

Why are things the way they are at Restaurang Nymble & THS Café? For almost 13 years, we’ve been asking the same questions: do THS and our members need to own their own restaurant in Nymble? Why are prices, quality and menus the way they are and which direction should the restaurant take? After all, the restaurant is here for us: the students. Osqledaren went digging for answers.

TEXT EDITOR-IN-CHIEF BENJAMIN JAVITZ ILLUSTRATION BENJAMIN JAVITZ PHOTO VICTORIA ROHRER

“It seems that we can have high expectations for Nymble's restaurant in the near future. With a restaurant manager who loves to have us students as a challenge and who has the background he does, we look forward to enjoying what is to come!” (original in Swedish) This is how Osqledaren introduced Johan Delerud in 2010, when he started as Verksamhetschef för THS Restaurang (Operations Manager for THS Restaurants). “We have a great target group here. Everyone is positive and happy!”, he said. Restaurang Nymble’s doors opened on the 4th of October 2010. It didn’t always stay this way through the last 13 years.

When I meet Johan for our interview, he’s just finished 2 intense weeks with external events - some of the biggest events the restaurant has organized this year. “The event we had last week was four days long, from early morning till late night. All of us worked 65 hours in 4 days. It's events like those that are important for THS and for our business as well. They are necessary for us to finance other parts, like the daily events for students.”

operational directive (Verksamhetsdirektiv) the THS board formulated.

It also means that the restaurant’s budget is part of THS - with all the possible implications. Initially, the idea was that the restaurant should aim to bear it’s own costs and run like a proper business. But that has never actually worked - throughout the years, several boards and union councils (KF, Kårfullmäktige) realized that going for a +/- 0 result while keeping the same quality and offers would just lead to higher prices for our members, or block the building even more with external events like fairs and company conferences competing with chapters and associations for space. This year, THS restaurant operations will lose about 2 million SEK according to

Of course none of these discussions are new. In OL#2 2013/14 (OL granskar: Nymble Restaurang, available on issuu.com/osqledaren), Osqledaren tried to find reasons and investigated the catering prices for events during the receptions - and looked into how the restaurant is connected to the alcohol serving permit in Nymble. It was clear that the restaurant business can only really work if we give Johan the necessary freedom to use his experience.

How satisfied are you with the variety of food available at Restaurang Nymble & THS Café?

“Let the restaurant run their business without students.” - that was one of the comments we received in our survey. I asked Johan what he thought about it: “Sometimes when we do events for different chapters, they can find it annoying and complicated to deal with THS. Because the restaurant is run by us, and we're not students. We're employed to run it, and that's the way it's gotta be. You cannot run a business like this otherwise. I know for a fact that a lot of chapters are very critical of THS and how things are handled here.”

A lot of us often forget that THS employs more than 10 staff in our restaurant operations. With several positions vacant, they had to hire temporary workers to keep up their lunch and catering work. The staff situation in the restaurant is quite difficult, and has of course taken a toll on much appreciated offers like the breakfast and vegetarian lunch buffet in the café: “They take a lot of time that we just don't have. With the price increases during the last year it has become very hard for us to predict our costs. You never know if 5 or 40 people will show up, so it wouldn’t be good business for us. We’d be losing money on it.”

How satisfied are you with the quality of food available at Restaurang Nymble & THS Café?

Our survey was answered by 87 students and 5 non-students. 10 of them were vegan, 12 vegetarian. They rated their satisfaction on a scale of 1 to 5.

The current staff is structured like this: Johan Delerud is the Operations Manager, employed by John Kåberg, chief-of-staff and boss of all the permanent employees at THS. Under him we have both Tina (as Restaurangchef) and Nils-Åke (as Kökschef) to manage the rest of the employees in their daily work.

The restaurant, with all its employees, is entirely owned and run by THS. To “create a lively union building through offering THS members affordable lunch with a low profit margin, and to offer catering to student events,” is the mission defined in the

the current prognosis. Last year it was 2,7 million, the year before 2,9 (numbers after fullkostnadstäckningen, a process that distributes the cost of Nymble’s upkeep, electricity, heating, administration and more among all parts of THS). Of course this is heavily influenced by the pandemic, inflation and energy prices - but it’s a trend that has been going on for the last 12 years. It’s money that the rest of THS has to generate somewhere else to keep the restaurant and catering operations running - so clearly we should be questioning what is happening, and try to find solutions. I decided that we should start a survey and ask what our students think - about the prices, about the menu, the quality and their perception of Nymble Restaurang.

Does he ever feel restricted in his work? “There are times when the board has made decisions without actually asking us. A couple of years ago they decided that vegetarian options should be the priority whenever they order food. Without realizing that I offered, many years ago, for them to order leftover food from us at a very cheap price. Because otherwise we would just throw it away. So they decided that it has to be vegetarian. All right. They said, “oh, I need 60 orders of vegetarian food!” We had to throw away our leftover food and start preparing 60 vegetarian dishes instead. Because that's what the board decided. If the board would have come to me and asked, I would have told them it's not a very good idea.”

“It shows a little bit of a lack of respect for our work, because the normal thing would be to ask us if you’re gonna do something that affects our business. I've been here for so many years. Working with students is fun and it's part of what we do and what we want to do every day! But it depends year by year. I don't like when people that are not involved in our business tell us what to do without asking us. And instead they come and tell us what we're supposed to do. Because then you just.. Here you are, you're their employee suddenly, that's supposed to imply whatever, and I know that's the whole business of THS - they’re the one

OL GRÄVER OL GRANSKAR IGEN: NYMBLE RESTAURANG

How satisfied are you with the current availability of vegetarian options at Restaurang Nymble?

3.1

How satisfied are you with the current availability of vegetarian options at THS Café?

How satisfied are you with the current availability of vegan options at Restaurang Nymble?

2.6

How satisfied are you with the current availability of vegan options at THS Café?

3.1

Our survey was answered by 87 students and 5 non-students. 10 of them were vegan, 12 vegetarian. They rated their satisfaction on a scale of 1 to 5. We conducted the survey in Puben during the entire lunch opening hours of the restaurant, via social media, posters and QR code flyers around Nymble and in some chapter halls. We would hoped to have more answers, especially from employees and other non-students.

deciding, but sometimes it's not even reasonable.”

You are their employee though, right? “The thing is, we've done so many things over the years that are a lot better than anyone would have expected, if they actually asked us how much we do for the environment. John [chief-of-staff/kanslichef at THS] will come to me and say “This paper says you need to do this.” And I’d explain to him what we actually do and that we already do a lot more than we should. We have not been good at communicating all the things we do.“

up that the current policy (that the restaurant operations should follow as much as possible) speaks of how "Food with a low climate footprint should be promoted in all parts of THS operations. If meat is offered, it should always be an active choice." This does not mean that only vegetarian food can be served during events.

The purpose of this article - and the survey - is to show the restaurant what their guests think, but even more to increase transparency and understand why things are the way they are, where Johan and his staff are coming from, what the background is.

about the vegetarian dishes the restaurant offers as one of the two daily options every Monday, and why only about 1/3 of the 92 students that answered the survey knew about it: “Maybe they don't come on Mondays, maybe they don't read the menu. No idea. Monday is generally a slow day for us when it comes to the vegetarian options. Maybe it's because two options are vegetarian. If you actually put the vegetarian dish next to chicken or beef, only 7% choose the vegetarian option.” Johan is certain that more vegetarian dishes wouldn’t actually sell.

On the other hand, 26 of the 92 guests we surveyed were very unsatisfied with the vegan options in the restaurant. “I mean, the survey had 22 people who are vegetarian or vegan. We do have a vegetarian option every day. There are weeks where we have 3. But it's hard to make everyone satisfied,” Johan replied. Could there instead be a weekly meat and daily vegetarian/vegan options?

“Maybe in a vegetarian restaurant. I'm pretty sure that if we went that route, we would lose a lot of our guests. The discussion sometimes is just ridiculous. Sustainability is not just about the environment, it’s also economic sustainability. Today we have a dish with chicken on the menu, with chicken from a farm close to Stockholm. One alternative option is tofu from China. I'm not sure what's best, to be honest."

Comment from our survey

Hearing this, I also contacted Adrian Södergren and Ossian Ahlkvist, who proposed the THS Environmental Policy to the Union Council on 18-05-2020 (KF, council of representatives from every chapter and our highest decision-making body). Adrian and Ossian mentioned that they did contact the board and chief-of-staff John with their proposal - the policy was developed further based on this contact.

John clarified that Johan was not asked to give input on the policy before it was passed though - due to how critical a response to the pandemic was at that time. John had also just started his position at THS. Things have changed a lot in this regard - John now tries to include the staff in all his decisions. It is also important to clear

Getting more into the results, I showed him what students thought about the quality and variety of his lunch menus. Is this part of his vision and philosophy? “Obviously, we spent a lot of time on it. I mean we could make things a lot easier if we wanted to. But the whole idea of the restaurant business is for it to be sustainable. Financially sustainable, sustainable for our staff. One of the most important parts for me is that we challenge ourselves. We don't take a lot of shortcuts, we actually cook food every day. We don't open boxes and just put it in the fryer. We try to prepare food that we like to eat ourselves.“

This leads us to another big topic I wanted to explore: vegan/vegetarian options and more sustainable menus. I asked Johan

"When we had this huge conference last week, they ordered lunch bowls: 70% vegetarian or vegan because they had this environmental policy. On the first day, the alternative salad bowl with salmon was out in minutes! The next day they asked us to do 50/50, the same thing happened. I understand that you have your policies - but maybe that's not what people actually want. And there are more aspects to this. When we first started 12 years ago, the norm was to cook 180 grams of meat per portion. Today it’s about 140.”

Johan also explains that it just takes more work to make vegetarian/vegan food: “With vegetarian and vegan food we would probably need more staff because it just takes more steps. But if you have a piece of salmon, you season it, put it in the oven. Boil the potatoes. Make the sauce, the salad. Done.”

I kept poking: one student commented “does it hurt anyone to only have one meat option per day?” He replied, "We have financial restrictions that say we need to bear our own cost. It’s wouldn’t be finan-

“I think a lot of students would be happy with a little lower quality for a lower price.”

cially sustainable. We also haven’t seen that our guests ask for this.”

While we were on the topic of CO2 emissions and more sustainable food, I was reminded of what I saw when I visited student union restaurants in Göteborg and Linköping - CO2 emissions for every dish on the menu: 1kgCO2 for a meat dish, 0,3 for the vegetarian alternative. “There's no time for us to do that sort of thing. I don't even know if that's important for our guests. To be honest with you, a lot of our guests don't even have time to read the menu. I'm sure those restaurants have a menu that's the same every five or six weeks. It makes their planning a lot easier. It's very relaxing to work that way.”

Comment from our survey

first started here, there was no way of organizing our trash. So we decided, before it was regulation, that we would separate all of our trash, which we've done for so many years. That happens nowhere else in Nymble. We reduce the amount of meat we use. We use a lot more vegetables. We reduce the amount of water we use. We try to cook food during the night, so it uses less electricity. We changed our dishwasher so it doesn't consume that much water, electricity and chemicals. We've done a lot of things on our own initiative that I think people are not aware of. “ And he’s right, I had no idea!

bread. You get a salad and you get coffee with lunch, and it's actually home cooked food! And my answer is always that we work a little bit harder and a little bit smarter. It's a little bit disrespectful for people to even suggest that we're being pricey. I understand some people want it to be cheaper for our students, but that's why we're here on a Saturday. That's why I'm here, on my 40th birthday, working at an event to make money for THS. “

“The way it works here is that Thursday is the day we set the menu for next week. We collect prices from all our suppliers and ask them: what can we get next week? What do you have a lot of right now? What can you get us a nice price on? And then we set the menu based on that. On Friday we finalize and print it. There's no time for us to sit down and calculate our emissions!“

We’re in a deadlock it seems. The restaurant - OUR restaurant - is under immense pressure, more than we often admit. And we should have an understanding for that. At the same time, Johan, Tina and Nils-Åke need to accept the feedback they get from their guests - and work with it. They have to work on showing respect to us, students who make mistakes, just as much as we need to work on respecting them more than we are.

Johan sees our perspective - but doesn’t want to compromise on his vision: “I think there's a lack of understanding. I understand the perspective that, oh, the quality could be worse and it could be cheaper, but how is that sustainable for my staff? Who wants to work in an environment where you don't challenge yourself, where you cook mashed potatoes from a bag? And if we did, how can we actually have the staff to prepare a nice three course dinner for an external event at the same time?“

Comment from our survey

Comment from our survey

I was interested to find out whether Johan thinks that the current menus follow the THS Environmental Policy that says food with low climate footprint should be prioritized. "If meat is served, it should always be an active choice.” If we have 13 different dishes per week and two of those are vegetarian/vegan, does that follow the policy we try to live up to? To me, it looks like vegetarian is the alternative, not the priority. Johan refers back to economic restrictions: “I wouldn't say it's like that. We also have a policy saying that we have to be economically sustainable and having vegetarian options every day will not be economically sustainable for us.”

It’s clear that Johan and his team are doing what they can with the restrictions and the pressure that THS puts on them: “We talk a lot about the environment. When I

Are there solutions when we look at the prices? About half of our answers said the difference between the price for THS members/ students and external guests should be bigger. Could this be one of the answers? Johan says that, on average, we have 50% THS Members, 20% other students and 30% external guests. “It's a 15kr price difference already. If we increased the external price then we would lose a couple of external guests. Some of those comments are hard to reply to. People live in this student bubble where they don't realize how much things actually cost - for me it's unbelievable how cheap we are. It cannot be cheaper and we're not making money on our lunches whatsoever.“

“What's important is that we have had a restaurant here for 12 years now. We're still in business. There's not a lot of places that actually are. We increase the amount of food we make every year. We do more, we cater for more people. We’re obviously doing something right, and we're really anxious to listen to all of this. “

“I have a clear idea of what we are doing. I have amazing colleagues. And then we see this. We are here every day. Our guests are not. We know the restrictions we have - in the kitchen, in our staff and from our suppliers. We have to make decisions based on that. I believe that everything we do is for the good of students. “

Comment from our survey - find more on osqledaren.se

“I do price comparisons every year and I'm embarrassed to see our prices when I speak to colleagues. They're like, how is that possible? How do you prepare lunch for 84 crowns a day? You bake your own

It’s clear that students don’t agree with Johan on his views. But this perception, whether true or not, can only change if we ask more questions, give more feedback, try to understand where the restaurant is coming from, what restrictions and pressure we put on them. If either one of the two sides cannot accept criticism, we will keep this strained relationship for a long time. And it will be on the back of the students AND on the back of Johan and his employees.

“Let the restaurant run their business without students.”

“Subsidize member's meals by increasing external prices”

“[...] Vegetarians like variety too. It hurts no one to just have one meat option a day.”

“Stop having pork in the pea soup as the default, that is a blatant violation of the sustainability policy.”

Studisabilities at KTH

Whether you're a student with a disability(ies) or just curious, here's everything you need to know. What is KTH doing to help? How do people feel about it? In this article I will try to give an overview on how disabilities are perceived at KTH, what resources are available for students who might need them, and what are the accessibility measures taken to ensure that all students have access to a fair and equal education.

We will meet Eric and Hanna, two students with firsthand exposure who can share their experiences with us. Eric is the Head of Student Welfare at THS. He has visual impairment and autism. Hanna is a student in KTH. She has conquered a battle against a more than 10 year long depression. We thank them for their kindness and interesting testimonies. The anonymous testimonies that will be included in this article are also gratefully acknowledged.

Eric: Funka [the KTH group that coordinates support at KTH] is giving students support during examinations, is able to provide mentor support for planning and organization, (...) but they also have physical resources such as the resource room, which is supposed to be a quiet place to study.

How does Funka help you with your studies at KTH?

Hanna: [My disability] was a long time depression. I got rid of it in 2019, so I don’t have a disability anymore. But [my mentor from FUNKA] helped me very much with organizing my studies. We booked like one

[2 hours] meeting each week. We would look through my study plans. She wouldn't necessarily help with what I was studying, but how to organize it. I still use a lot of the study techniques that she taught me, especially with the beginning of the semester. I am organizing a sheet where I write down each day and then all deadlines of the different courses.

Does KTH offer sufficient help to students with disabilities in your opinion? What could KTH do more to allow students with disabilities to have the same chances in their studies as students without any disabilities?

Eric: I think that most of the faculty is already aware about what sort of resources some students require. The information given to the teaching assistants about the fact that there are students with special needs can however [be improved]. For example, I write exams on a computer and sometimes I had teaching assistants telling me “you're not allowed to use your computer”. I wouldn't say that there's a severe issue with communication, it's something that usually gets clarified in five seconds. But this is only from my personal point of view, I cannot say for certain that other students have not encountered bigger obstacles.

Anonymous-1: [Concerning myself], my main issue is with how teachers communicate/structure their course. If there is anything that is unclear, I don't function. In the past, many teachers have been great, but there have also been some that don't

communicate to the students in time, have vague descriptions of projects and assignments or change things during the course which makes it very difficult for me to follow along.

There have also been group projects, where you are required to work in a group of 6-7 people in order to pass the course. With autism, this is very difficult, takes a lot of energy and requires skills that I do not have.

Anonymous-2 [translated from Swedish]: One problem with extended writing time for example, is that when others have finished writing seminar tests, the environment becomes quite messy, which is directly counterproductive for those who need extended writing time. Exercise leaders rarely say anything.

If I understand them correctly, it sounds like Funka does help a lot with your studies. One thing to really improve is that the teaching assistants and professors should be more aware of disabilities. They should be more trained to know about accessibility.

Hanna: It's very hard to do. Most professors don't have the interest to learn these things. Trying to also enforce [equal opportunities and gender diversity] with the teachers, it's really hard.

I don’t know how we could change that. Professors and teachers are a main part of studying. It would be nice to have an im-

Leaving at the very last minute to run and catch your metro, not having to think where the elevator is in a new building, taking the stairs to class, living a chill life without having to take antidepressants… it sounds great - but not everyone can freestyle their life to the same extent.

TEXT MÉLINE PARENT IMAGE OSQLEDAREN

provement from KTH on these problems. Do you think Funka is transparent about the help they provide, is it easy to contact them?

Eric: In my experience, when I started studying in Flemingsberg, I contacted them and then we had an introductory meeting. I explained what sort of disabilities I have and how it affects my studies and my everyday life. Then they responded by informing me what sort of support and resources that I am entitled to.

Hanna: It wasn't that transparent. I worked last year with some Funka questions. I have seen the sheet of about 50 different things that you can get with Funka [that I didn’t know about, even if I was a Funka student]. (...) I think I was also one of the first students with depression to actually apply for support. They didn't quite know what to do with me. It wasn't that standard cause it was mostly people with dyslexia and also people with physical disabilities (and several others disabilites that Funka students had). I've tried to talk with a lot of people with depression since then, to get them to also apply.

Anonymous-3: Personally, I don’t believe that Funka is able to offer any support which would be helpful to me. This is not because I think they are bad, and certainly not because I don’t struggle with problems from my disability. It’s just that none of the problems I have happen to fall in areas where Funka can provide support.

I also really do think it’s important that (...) people know the inherent limitations of disability support. The truth is that even if Funka functions perfectly, that still won’t mean that all students with disabilities are able to function as well as their nondisabled counterparts. Funka is an aid for some, but it is not a cure for anyone. We will never not be disabled.

This is something really important to keep in mind. Students with disabilities have different challenges that are inherent to the fact of being disabled. Funka or any other helping group could never erase disability.

In your opinion, who should be the main actor in the Student Union to help with accessibility?

Hanna: There are things everyone can do to make the environment better for everyone else: it can be from THS or KTH for whom it is easier to work with these issues, but also from the chapters and individuals. Concerning the chapter it can be more challenging to focus on this. One year is not enough time to actually make an impact in most things. And the things that you make an impact on are the things that you are very interested in. (...)They're like “ah, but I didn't get elected to work on these things”. Especially most disabilities, where the best result is usually received when also taking into account that everyone works differently. (...) But they can also do a lot of things while being really close to students. Everyone needs to work together to have a more accessible university!

What is THS working on in regards to disabilities?

Eric: I will say that we do have a lot of interesting projects. These projects cover everything that can affect the psychosocial study environment, such as mental health awareness, inclusivity, international students, reaching out to new students, and making sure that they understand the resources that are available to them. And on the accessibility front, I would say that my main project is the subgroup “Insight”. They do some formative activities such as board games and card games. The core part of it is just the community and being able to discuss how your life is going.

Hanna: I think it's much easier for THS [than for the chapters] to force changes. I think they have done a great job doing that in the reception, but unfortunately the reception is not so long. I've heard from many people with disabilities that during the reception it's super fun to be a part of it, but afterwards, they kind of get forgotten.

We can see that there are quite a few different initiatives by Funka, THS or associations at KTH. Talking about society, do you think that physical and psychological impairments are treated equally?

Hanna: They have their own difficulties. If you have a physical disability that is usually very visible for people to see. It makes that person feel different from the start. But it is also easier for people to adapt to that person and be reminded about it, and

then they can ask how they can help and be there for them and adapt things.

When people have an invisible disability, they aren't that open about it, especially not in a new situation. They can hide it more, but it's still there, it still affects them. I don't think today's society works well for either of them. It would be great if society was more adapted.

Thank you a lot for all these testimonies! Is there anything else that you would like to share with the readers?

Eric: I would definitely encourage the people that are interested in such questions to check out THS Insight. It is such a great and diverse community to interact with and learn from! You don’t need to have a disability to join, you just have to be curious!

Hanna: When I was sick, I didn't think it was possible to get healthy. So I guess that's the thing I want to say, that it is possible. I'm not sure if it is for everyone, but it is possible for some. And Funka can help if you have depression.

KTH can provide help with your studies through FUNKA. For inquiries and assistance, FUNKA's contact details are available on their KTH webpage.

For social purposes, the THS subgroup Insight (@ths_insight_kth on Instagram) is organizing social events with the aim of creating a safe place for all students at KTH.

UNDERHÅLLNING

The Great Summer Escape

The summer time brings forth the urge to either take a breather and simply laze around as you bask under the sunlight, preferably with a light breeze and cool drink or to explore a new sight, where everything is a novelty to you, the people, the food and history. In this travel guide, we aim to provide spots that can fulfill either ambitions, all while considering each student’s (current) kryptonite: money!

TEXT ALCINA MUNENE PERSSON & DIANA CRISTINA CULINCU ILLUSTRATION CHIARA CUCCUI

Pelion, Greece

If you’re yearning for a gorgeous peninsula surrounded by bluegreen beaches and particularly enjoy outdoor activities and traditional villages, then Pelio might be the destination for you this summer.

Places to visit: the various beaches (e.g Mylopotamos beach), the steam powered train Moutzouris, Tsagarada village

Things to try: Hiking (there are a number of hiking trails available that allow you to take in the scenery of the surrounding sea and mountains), the local spirits and wines as well as their most known local dish, traditional pies named “pites”.

Cheap accommodation: Archontiko Kantartzi in Tsagarada

How to get there: Interrail to Athens, train to Volos and then via bus or car. Otherwise you can take a flight* to Volos and take the train or car to Pelion.

Puglia, Italy

Looking for beautiful coastal sights and delicious cuisine? Look no further, Plugia has both for you along its streets decorated with the characteristic whitewashed and hut shaped houses.

Places to visit: The multitude of beaches (e.g. Polignano a Mare Beach), World Heritage Sites: Alberobello and Matera, the baroque city Lecca which offers beautiful architectural sights

Things to try: Various festivals (e.g. Cavalcata di Sant'Oronzo), the local cuisine which is characterized by seafood and pasta dishes and known for specialities such as burrata cheese and orecchiette pasta.

Cheap accommodation: B&B La Muraglia

How to get there: Interrail to Italy and then make use of regional buses or trains. Air travel* is also an alternative.

Brussels, Belgium

Feeling in the mood for delicious chocolate, trying the world’s largest variety of beer and visiting the European parliament? Then the Belgian capital, Brussels, is the optimal spot.

Places to visit: Delirium Bar with a Guiness World Record for the largest amount of beers available to taste (2004 different beers), The EU Parliament, The Royal Palace of Brussels, The Peeing statues (Manneken Pis, Jeanneke Pis and Zinneke Pis), The Old Town, The Basilica of the Sacred Heart (5th biggest church in the world, known for its unique art deco style), The Atomium

Things to try: Belgian Waffles (Both kinds! The Liege waffle and the Brussels waffle), the “Mitraillette” sandwich with fries, a common student dish.

Cheap accommodation: Jacques Brel Youth Hostel

How to get there: Interrail or air travel*

Carcassonne, France

Carcassonne as a whole is a protected site listed on the UNESCO World Heritage list. That reason alone can point you to the rich history present on the medieval walls of the city. If you wish to skip the blazing sun and the crowded beaches, then this city might be up your alley.

Places to visit: The Medieval Fortified City, Basilica of SaintNazaire, the World Heritage Site Canal du Midi, Pont Vieux, the less medieval and more modern part of the city: La Bastide Saint-Louis, Porte Narbonnaise which is one of the main gates to the medieval city

Things to try: Visit the local market Les Halles de Carcassonnes, traditional French dishes such as cassoulet and local wines.

Cheap accommodation: Hotel Astoria

How to get there: Interrail to France, trains to Carcassonne are available from most regional cities (e.g. Toulouse, Marseille, Paris, Lille, Montpellier). Air travel* is also an alternative.

Prague, Czech Republic

Prague is a city known for its history and its connections to well known figures, such as Franz Kafka. It’s the perfect city if you wish to explore gothic and baroque architecture, all while visiting a lively city which offers plenty of options in terms of nightlife.

Places to visit: The Lennon Wall, World Heritage Sites: the Old Town Square (more specifically the astronomical clock tower), Prague Castle, and Charles Bridge, the Jewish Quarter, the multitude of breweries and pubs scattered throughout the city where you can taste a variety of beer at very af fordable prices!

Things to try: A river cruise through Vltava River that runs through Prague, the vast Czech cuisine which includes dishes such as dumplings, goulash and schnitzel.

Cheap accommodation: Bun ker Factory Prague

How to get there: Interrail or air travel*

Faro, Portugal

Looking to visit southern Europe as well as a coastal destination? Then Faro might just be the optimal spot for you. Here you can explore beautiful beaches and old architecture mostly present at their churches and museums.

Places to visit: Praia de Faro, the Old Town, Ria Formosa Natural Park, Cathedral de Faro, Bishop’s Palace

Things to try: Bike around the city, visit local markets, a day trip to visit nearby towns, the local cuisine which is primarily seafood dishes, the Silves Medieval Festival in August.

Cheap accommodation: Residencial Avenida

How to get there: Interrail or air travel*

If you want to stick closer to home, what about a trip around the Baltic Sea? Bonus? Cheap prices, great food and multiple transportation methods, to fit every preference and budget.

Gdańsk, Poland

What about a visit to Geralt of Rivia’s birth country, to eat pierogi and drink kvass (seriously, you need to try kvass, there’s nothing like it!)? A stunning coastal city in Poland, Gdańsk is a treasure trove dressed in amber of beauty, culture, and history, marked by centuries of maritime trade and battles.

Places to visit: Mariacka Street, The Crane, Neptune's Fountain, Black Pearl Ship (you can even go on a pirate cruise!), Swinging Footbridge to Marina, Footbridge to Ołowianka - the bascule bridge, AmberSky ferris wheel, Museum of Gdańsk - Main Town Hall, Basilica of St. Mary.

If you have an extra day, don’t miss out on a day trip to Malbork Castle, a World Heritage site, and the largest castle in the world measured by land area. A stunning Medieval fortress, Malbork was the home of the teutonic knights in the 13th and 14th centuries. Our advice: buy the train tickets online, and load up on water and snacks before boarding, as the train station can be busy and it is hard to find shops close by.

Cheap accommodation: Grand Hostel, right by the river, in the heart of the old city.

How to get there: air travel*

Tallinn, Estonia

From charming neighborhoods and off-the-beaten-path museums to quirky cafes and unique shopping destinations, Tallinn has something for every type of traveler looking to explore beyond the usual tourist hotspots. With its narrow cobblestone streets, medieval architecture, colorful buildings, and stunning sea views, Tallinn is a must-visit destination for any traveler looking for a special and memorable experience. Don’t miss out on viewing the streets from above from the countless viewing platforms and towers spread all throughout the city and have a cup of coffee at Café Maiasmokk, the oldest operational café in Estonia.

Places to visit: Toompea Hill, Tallinn Town Hall, Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, and Toompea Castle, the old Town Hall Pharmacy, Kadriorg Park and Kadriorg Art Museum, Kalaranna Promenade, Lennusadam.

Cheap accommodation: Fat Margaret's Hostel

How to get there: Tallink ferry, overnight bus from Riga, air travel*

Riga, Latvia

Riga, the capital city of Latvia, is a hidden gem in the heart of the Baltic States. With its stunning mix of gothic, baroque, art nouveau and modernist architecture, rich history, and vibrant culture, Riga is a must-visit destination for any traveler seeking a unique and unforgettable experience. Don’t forget to join the boat trips along the Daugava river or the old town, and try the Latvian cold beet soup at Lido!

Places to visit: The Swedish Gate, House of the Black heads, the Cat House, The National Library of Latvia, St. Peter's Church, the Dome Square

Cheap accommodation: Blue Bird capsule hostel, right in the Dome Square, in the old city

How to get there: Tallink ferry, airtravel*

*Before you book your tickets and pack your bags: A lot of the countries mentioned can be reached through ways other than air travel. In fact, an environmentally friendly way students could spend traveling throughout the summertime is through interrailing. Over the years, the Interrail has grown in popularity, allowing students and casual travelers to visit multiple cities with a single pass. You’re free to travel through Europe and visit 33 countries. The interrail pass can be purchased for 4 days and up to 3 months. It’s a wonderful alternative if you wish to quickly pass through multiple cities and can allow you to visit neighboring countries in the same day! If you are to choose night time travel then you can even save up some extra coins by combining accommodation and travel in one.

Chasing Boredom With Snails

the exact opposite way that I do. Someone whose every moment is filled with excitement and adventure.

Are you bored? Me too. And more so in the town of Yawnsville, where I current ly reside. It is a small, uneventful, boring town. It seems that nothing ever happens here, and I fear that inviting anyone for a visit will be a cruel punishment. I don't know if it's possible to die of boredom, but the risk is certainly present. To give you an idea of just how dull it is here, the most exciting thing that has ever happened was the day I found two snails. I placed them at the same starting line and tempted them with a lettuce leaf. Ah, the movement, the unsurmountable speed, the passion of the slimy troopers. The best three hours of my life!

As I sit here in Yawnsville, trying to think of ways to entertain myself, I can't help but wonder how the rest of the world is living. Are people out there chasing their dreams, learning new skills and exploring new places? Or are they just as bored as I am, trapped in a monotonous routine only to be broken by the occa sional snail race? Lost in thought, I imagine the existence of a counterpart of mine, someone who experiences life in

I put myself in my counterpart’s shoes, trying to imagine living a life full of constant activity, indulgence, and sensory overload. In the parallel world, boredom doesn’t appear in my dictionary and breath-taking pleasures dominate my every moment. One experience is followed by another; each more powerful than the previous one. However, soon, I feel a long, dark, looming shadow of vertigo coming closer. What felt like an exciting rollercoaster ride turns out to be a never-ending fall. Because when one thing is over, something else has already started. Sleep becomes undesirable, as it takes away time from what seems to be more important. Stopping the motion feels impossible; the inertia being too strong. The constant bombardment of activities is packed with shallow pleasure, devoid of meaning.

Returning to my current state, I question which is worse: the freezing inaction of Yawnsville or the scorching heat of a life overstimulated? While both can be torturous in their ways, I finally come to a decision and smile. I choose the frigid boredom over the heated overload, the cold and rainy weather over the violent volcano eruption. Because if common wisdom is to be followed "there is no bad weather, only bad clothes". A sudden clap of thunder outside snaps me out of my thoughts. Perhaps, Yawnsville has hidden gems that I have yet to discover. With careless enthusiasm, I go on a search for snails. But first, I slip into a cozy raincoat.

As we move far away from home, loneliness or boredom often follows. Sometimes, emotional trauma overshadows, or the new place does not meet our expectations. Can nature come to our rescue?

TEXT DAVID FERNANDEZ BONET ILLUSTRATION MARIA ZELENIKA

CHASING BOREDOM WITH SNAILS

Learning From the 1 in a Millions

How does one become the “one in a million”? Through sheer luck, hard work, a bit of both or something else entirely? A while back, we attended TedxKI, where several speakers told their stories, all connected to the common theme of “the butterfly effect” - how one small change can set the course for someone’s entire life. So, what do these “one in a million” journeys look like?

Speaker Anna Duberg is a researcher on the stress-reducing effects of dancing, and her method has already improved the mental health of several young people. Because of her research, dancing is now used as a complement to other health care, and her approach focuses on allowing people to come as they are and do things their own way. As a woman doing scientific research on dance, being taken seriously, just as she is, is not something that she takes for granted. Her research has been questioned, she has been called naive, and people have doubted her. Despite that, Duberg has stood her ground and she has developed a great way to improve people’s health, through something as simple as movement. With great ideas, a positive message and a belief in what she does, Duberg has become one in a million.

With similar conviction and courage, Åsa Sandberg found her path through a positive change. Sandberg shines a new light on the importance of valuing products that we have in our kitchens. Her passion for the subject of sustainable solutions and systemic change was evident in her talk. She dedicates her life to sharing her knowledge and inspiring others to pay attention

to their own behavioural habits around food production, consumption and waste. Sandberg stuck to her instincts to follow her interest and admiration for zero-waste food management in the household. This comes to show that even the topics clos est to home could be a potential route for research, development or entre preneurship.

This was also the case for Wilma Emanuelsson’s who developed a love for the world of hacking and cybersecurity as a primary school student. At only 19 she is a CEO and Founder of iTrack Read ing - an eye-to speech reading software to make written language more accessible to people with learning disabilities such as dyslexia or neurodevelopmental disorders like ADHD. It was her childhood dream to become a hacker and as you can already guess - she achieved that goal pretty fast. During her talk she shared how she used her hacking skills in school to help out her classmates or erase a “late” penalty in the registry. Her problem solving and eagerness to help others has led her to reach for the stars and beyond.

Unfortunately not everyone is so lucky to thrive in a individuality-supportive environment. Camilla Hamid was supposed to be

a doctor - at least according to her parents. In order to make them proud, she suppressed her passion for teaching, working hard to fulfill a dream that ultimately wasn’t hers. According to Hamid, the turning point came when she had her first daughter. Stuck on a path that wasn’t making her happy, she realized that this was not the kind of example she wanted to set for her children. So she stopped resisting the passions that had been there all along - teaching and baking. Now a well-known cookbook author, teacher and TV chef, she has proved that no matter our background, we should believe in ourselves and pursue our dreams.

This applies to all of us. Everyone has a unique journey and has the opportunity to reach their full potential with enough grit and persistence. This short list of exceptional individuals is enough to prove that there is no set recipe for success. This might come as a disappointment, however we encourage to see this as an opportunity. Everyone, no matter their stage in life or career has potential to reach their full “stardom and glory”. The only common denominator is staying true to your intuition and interest. Being present during that journey is what will allow true fulfillment.

TEXT SARA KATZER & LINA LÖFSTRAND ILLUSTRATION SARA KATZER

PÅ CAMPUS

What’s Next for Nymble?

Have you ever wondered why Gasquen’s toilets are made of metal? Why are there random columns outside KårX? Or simply even why Nymble feels like a maze at times? With renovations ongoing, Osqledaren dives into Nymble, why it looks the way it does and what’s next.

TEXT ROISIN CALLAGHAN ILLUSTRATION TINGYU SU

ther expand upwards to make the kitchen area have a second floor or to start a new extension in the rocky area next to Gröten. The kitchen already has a history of several renovations and moves within the building including it moving, expanding, being

that is currently served doesn’t match their expectations from a campus restaurant, instead opting for something more simple and friendly to their wallets. You can read more students' opinions on page 26 of this issue.

Before any large-scale new construction can happen there will be a small expansion and renovation to the kitchen this summer, taking away space from several meeting rooms and the bookshop. The restaurant is a downsized version of what was previously there due to a lack of business around 2008. The previous larger version took up the entire space of the current restaurant and also the bookstore. The new proposal is an increase in size but it will still not be as large as the pre 2008 version. This summer's construction will put further strain on our already in demand resources as we currently lack meeting rooms as well as spaces to host small dinners. These desired spaces will have to wait until a large construction mentioned in the previous paragraph can happen, which may take many years.

In the current building climate sustainability is at the forefront of design, or it at least should be. Considering that Nymble is approaching 100 years since construction the question of what it will take to reduce energy costs and its climate footprint arises. Can we just fill Nymble’s many flat roofs with solar panels? It’s a feasible option and there is definitely a desire within THS to have a more sustainable environment but securing funding is challenging. Nymble is unique as it is owned by THS as opposed to KTH which makes it harder to find money for these projects - previous renovations of Nymble have been funded through donations from both individuals and companies. For one construction phase almost 75 million SEK was donated which raises the question; can we successfully do it again?

Nymble has had three major stages in its development thus far the proposed new expansion could mark its fourth phase. Almost 10 years ago Nymble was zoned as a protected building, meaning additional approval is needed before any construction would happen. Many believe this is the reason why major changes are not possible; however, only a portion of the building is restricted by this. Besides the external facades appearance, some 3rd floor rooms and both staircases, there is little limitation on altering the existing building. Since Nymble is so segmented between many student associations, the alterations behind closed doors often go unnoticed or unapproved since there’s so much else happening within the building. On our walkthrough we noticed several additions or alterations that the architects were not made aware of as well as things like holes punched in ceilings, extensive

wear and tear and some general disregard for the space. Durability has always been a concern, that’s why there’s things like steel frame chairs and metal toilets in Gasquen in the hopes that they’ll withstand rowdy student parties. Of course the architects were aware that this would be a student building and the implications of that but it’s still disappointing to see it this way.

With each extension there’s a dramat ic increase in space within the building which has led to most rooms having mul tiple locations throughout Nymble’s history. Hyllan used to be the restaurant’s kitchen, Panorama was once a gym, a doctor used to have their office in the Kårspexet room and even our own OL office was former ly the caretaker's home. These previous configurations answer some questions about the more confusing parts of Nym ble. Hyllan’s floor was originally lower be cause when the kitchen was there and the windows were designed to be at standing height for chefs preparing food. When Hyl lan changed to be what it is today the floor was raised to make the window height comfortable for people sitting instead. The columns around Panorama on the ground floor existed far before the gym was re moved and the glass walls were added. The strange black bin looking things outside of KårX are actually ventilation shafts as the original floor is almost 1 metre lower than the existing height.

Don't Expect the Worst - Vol. 2

It’s been 8 months since I moved to Sweden and I’m glad to say that my time here is nowhere as scary and stressful as the first two weeks have been. My transition to living in the Swedish capital was one of the most stressful experiences I had in my life. There is no sugar coating it. During the first month I doubted my decision, worried that I wouldn’t fit in in such a prestigious school, and I was scared I wouldn’t find permanent accommodation.

Luckily with every month that passed I realised that my expectations of the worst were just that - expectations. In reality everything eventually fell into place. The stress, chaos and lack of certainty slowly dissolved into the background. Now, looking back at the autumn semester, I definitely notice how much KTH and living in a Swedish environment has influenced and shaped me as a person. As cheesy as it sounds I am no longer the same person that moved to Sweden back in August. But I must say all the changes I noticed are actually for the better.

First of all throughout the first few months of attending KTH I quickly picked up on the differences in educational environment

compared to the previous systems I have been part of. I was shocked to realise that for the first time ever I was not overwhelmed by the workload and extremely stressed over deadlines. I found my pace of work that fit my preference and finally felt a level of balance between study ing and living. I can only speak from my own experience, yet I am convinced that this must be a common occurrence for people coming from non-swedish ed ucational backgrounds. For context before ending up here in Sweden for my master’s I grew up in the strict schooling environment in northern Poland and then transitioned to the fast paced output-based higher educa tion of Northern Ireland. After moving to Stockholm I suddenly found a way not to overwork myself or feel guilty for closing my laptop at 5pm. For the first time since starting my Architectur al education in 2019 I have reclaimed my weekends as not “extra time to do work” but days off. KTH teachers at the Architec ture school that I have had class with all

encourage following your own instincts and interests within projects and assignments. Despite an outline of requirements or descriptive briefs, students are allowed to put their own twist and showcase their interpretation of certain statements or read-

TEXT & ILLUSTRATION SARA KATZER

Secondly, Sweden has taught me the value of connections and learning about other people’s journeys. Coming to Stockholm I knew no one. I made it a mission to be open to new friend ships and connections. I dedicated time to organise meetups and weekend activities to nurture new bonds. It was worth it. The friendships that have built over the past 8 months have al lowed me to express myself, be cared for, explore the city and attend events I never imagined I could even enter.

From a TED talk event, to a Nobel Prize conference, from the Stockholm Furniture Fair to the Study In Sweden meetups - putting myself “out there” has really enriched my stay so far. Stockholm has shifted from being a foreign city to a place I feel at home in. It’s now become a place full of memo ries, friends, contacts and comfort. It has given me exposure to a city life where there is always something to see, do or try new things.

Swedish culture has definitely taught me to appreciate the outdoors. Whether it is a short walk around the neighborhood, a hike in the forest or just sitting outside for a coffee break, it has taught me to be grateful and present. Due to the fact that the weather in the winter months is harsh and dark, Swedes have really mastered the art of appreciating the little things. Switching from describing the sunset at 2pm as “depressing” to “cosy” is definitely borderline delusional, but effective. Since moving here I have found myself being much more appreciative of any sliver of sunshine, break in the snow and any temperature over 5 Degrees Celsius.

both KTH and Sweden in general has taught me is “slow and steady wins the race” and the advantage of starting early. This applies to all sorts of paperwork, errands and organisation. An example is signing up for housing queues. When I moved to Sweden I didn’t have any accommodation sorted. If I had started looking for places to stay earlier then I would not be in a situation where I would be staying in a hotel for the first two weeks of uni. Another ex ample is sorting out per sonal numbers and ID. Both these admin tasks require time so it’s not worth waiting and pro crastinating to do.

Finally, a thing that living in Stockholm has taught me is em bracing individuality. Whether it’s star stickers on your suitcase, extravagant outfits or extravert ed personality, there is space for all of it. This might sound like broken record but being yourself and holistically embracing your uniqueness, talents, skills, culture and knowledge is probably the most loving thing you could do for your self and the people around you. Empowering your voice and personality is the best thing that Stockholm reminds me to do. It’s defi nitely the most meaningful out of the changes I have no ticed since moving here.

actually healthy?!?!? Big up for you!!!!” I know these concepts are probably not something you are hearing for the first time. Odds are you are already living this

Hej THS, vad gör ni egentligen? /Osqledaren

Do you know what the management team at THS is actually doing every day?

13 students work full-time in Nymble for a year, and their salary is partly paid by you! To make their work more transparent, we ask them tough questions in every edition of Osqledaren.

Kårordförande | Union President Cornelia Haag ordf@ths.kth.se

1. The academic & operational year is almost over, how do you feel? Some of you are leaving!

2. Individual spicy question!

1. It's been a very fun year in many ways, a very stressful one as well! Leaving is hard, but it also feels good to go back and continue what I started in my studies.

Vice kårordförande | Union Vice President

Karl Arthursson vordf@ths.kth.se

för utbildningsinflytande | Head of Educational Affairs

Filip Axelsson utbildning@ths.kth.se

1. Definitely mixed emotions. On the one hand I am looking forward to getting back into my studies and finally get my degree but on the other hand I will have a large THS shaped hole in my heart. One difficult thing right now is being mindful about the projects I start since I won't be here to finish them.

2. Where are the anonymous exams? Thought that would be done by now? If you mean the decision from KTH, then so did I! The process have gotten delayed but I am confident that we will have a decision in hand before I step down. When it comes to the actuall implementation; that timeline is unaffected and we will know more about it in the fall.

2. Are you leaving a lot of open projects for the next THS President? There's a lot of good things but also some challenges to being a ""one year organization"" - I don't want to leave too many open projects because I don't want to take away from why my successor was elected! Some long-term projects like improving the central structure of THS, our internal and external communication will be here for many more successors, not just for next year

Projektledare för | Project Manager for THS Armada

Leonard Hökby armada@ths.kth.se

1. Feel excited! When you read this we have just gotten all the Team Leaders and Coordinators on board and are planning many things: 1. Interesting companies for all students. 2. A lot of nice merch! 3. Fun events and lunch leactures for three weeks. Follow @ thsarmada for more info!

2. So.. Armada cruise, yes or no? Hahahaha this again! It will all become clear this autumn, join Armada as a host to find out and follow our IG @thsarmada to not miss the recruitment!

1. Leaving is kinda hard and I was sad about it when it dawned on me a couple of months ago. However, now I have come to terms with it and I look forward to wrapping up and giving my successor a great handover!

2. Are you leaving behind a good economic situation for your successor? Not really, a large part of our income comes from KTH and the government and that actually decreased a little bit for this year. With inflation this high for so long, a lot of our costs are significantly higher. I have come to realise that an economic crisis could have big consequences on student life, and that worries me a little.

Chef för utbildningsinflytande | Head of Educational Affairs

Maja Rosén utbildning@ths.kth.se

1. A few months in my work days are now full of exciting projects that I have been a part of from the beginning. As me and Filip talk about the work that willl happen at THS and KTH this fall I often smile as I am looking forward to being a part of it :)

2. How do our own study spaces in Nymble compare to the rest of campus? Nymble has a good variation of study spaces but we need to improve Nya Matsalen with electrical outlets and dividers for it to be up to our students' standards. Microwaves nearby is a plus!

TEXT OSQLEDAREN & THS MANAGEMENT TEAM

Chef

Mottagningssamordnare | Reception Coordinator

Filippa Larsson mottagning@ths.kth.se

1. It feels incredibly bittersweet! There have been some frustrating moments, some exciting moments and it feels like I'm still learning! But it's going to be nice to go back to a normal life and see what my successor does with the role!

2. How long is the wait for an association to get a room in Nymble? Unfortunately, there is a limited amount of space in Nymble. How we use, and should use, that space is an important question. Currently, all the space that we do have is being used, and it isn't very common for an association to lose their room. Under the system we have right now, it's hard to predict when an association might get access to their own space.

Luna Mansour international@ths.kth.se

1. It's a very strange feeling! I'm happy to have achieved a part of the vision I had for the position, but there's still sooo much more I want to work on and it seems like there's so little time!

2. How well does the cooperation with KTH around the international reception work? The communication works smoothly most of the time, we've established a good relationship over the years! However, when it comes to arrival days, it's a very tricky balance between what we believe is good for the students & between how KTH thinks it should be run. The first part of the reception clashes with KTH's vacations & that makes things difficult from our side.

Näringslivschef | Head of Business Relations

Erik Nordlöf naringsliv@ths.kth.se

1. It will be sad to leave this behind, but emotionally i feel ready to finish this chapter of my life. I have learnt a lot and will always be happy i took the time to do this

2. Why doesn't THS organize more lunch lectures? Cuz I'm lazy. No but jokes aside i don't think that should be a priority for my role as it currently stands. Supporting chapters is vital, especially since they do lunch lectures themselves.

Evenemangschef | Event Manager

David Schalin event@ths.kth.se

to be fun doing the handover for the new KL even if I'm still staying until January, I'm hyped for the reception and working with"my own" budget.

2. How well does the cooperation between Programgruppen and the restaurant work? It completely depends on the event or reason for cooperation. I cooperate with the restaurant on a daily basis about shared spaces such as the loading dock, everything in this case is about mutual respect for the fact that we both have important operations running alongside eachother. Usually during events the cooperation is on top.

Studiesocialt ansvarig | Head of Student Social Activities

Emil Blocksjö studiesocialt@ths.kth.se

1. It feels sad to be honest. I've had a blast working with the students. The work is intense however so I'm happy to move to a more normal workspace. The most sad part is that I'm leaving KTH. But watch out, I will of course be back visiting all of my friends on pubs or other activities were alumni are welcome!

2. How well did SSCO handle VPR? To be honest, the issue is bigger than what you see at first glance. They have actually done quite well this year under the circumstances. The organization right now is quite not there yet to please what our chapters want, but we have gotten very good answers from SSCO and I'm excited to work together with them to improve the situation before I leave my position. SSCO are listening to what we have to say and they are very cooperative!

Studiemiljöansvarig | Head of Student Welfare

Eric Forsell studiemiljo@ths.kth.se

1. I'm only just getting started, and it's getting more exciting by the day!

2. Do the chapters care enough about JML-work? It varies greatly by chapter, but every chapter needs to continously revise and think critically of their JML work.

Projektledare för | Project Manager for SNNC

Gabriel Pinheiro snnc@ths.kth.se

1. I feel very excited about what is to come. It feels very good to see the project starting to flourish and welcome more people. We have a theme, have decided to work on the subthemes and are looking into all the details of the party, even by creating now things that are only needed in December, just so we can use all of the time we have to make the details perfect. It also is the time to get all of our heads together and really think of how we want the party to shape this year. It has been a good period and we are looking forward to making even more progress in the second semester!

2. How much is SNNC and the construction week going to negatively impact study spaces and lunch for students in Nymble? I cannot answer this question at the time of writing for this magazine. The plans are being discussed and worked on to minimize the impact as much as possible, but it would be irresponsible of me to deny that there will be an impact. SNNC is a big event and we really need time to make sure all our decor and details are ready by the big night. Parts of Nymble will be closed off at an early stage for construction, but all the information on that will come out on the second semesterm once our details have been fixed.

Chefredaktör

för | Editor-in-chief for Osqledaren

Benjamin Javitz osqledaren@ths.kth.se

1. To be very honest, I'm not quite ready to leave. I've started a lot of changes at OL and I would love to see them develop more. But it's part of how THS works to hand over to someone else and let them contribute their own ideas and dreams!

2. Is there gonna be a magazine next year? Osqledaren (and Kårbladet before 1959) has survived for almost 80 years - and will live on, hopefully for 80 more! OL always changes, and so do the ways that we consume news, so we'll adapt. The magazine, website, social media, videos, podcasts, there's a lot of ideas and I'm sure there will be people that want to realize them!

Head of THS International

Hej då, Presidium!

TEXT CORNELIA HAAG & KARL ARTHURSSON PHOTO BENJAMIN JAVITZ

Cornelia, current THS President, and Karl, current Vice President, will hand over their positions at the end of June - how does it feel to leave your posts?

Karl: We have worked with the PM for Nymble and Osqvik, to make them more accessible for our members. We have started - or KL have started - talking a lot about communication and visibility. We've had chapter presidents visit THS board meetings, I think that's important! It's more than last year, and we want more people to come, every Monday in Panorama!

What have you learned during this year?

Karl: I sort of learned how to handle a budget with a revenue of 45 million! I’ve also learned how to talk about difficult subjects. I think I've become a much better listener.

Your time as President and Vice President is almost over - how does that feel?

It's been a very fun year, a very stressful one as well. We’re both happy that we’ve done it, but also starting to feel ready to do other things. It’s nice to continue what you started in your studies (Cornelia) or start working (Karl). But this is also the time when we’ve become quite comfortable in our roles! Taking on big decisions, giving advice, putting up a good structure for our work, it’s like that only started in the last one or two months.

What was harder than you thought?

What were your biggest challenges?

Cornelia: What I didn’t expect as much was prioritizing. There are a lot of things that arrive on our desks that we don’t necessarily have to do - but we have to decide who should handle the question, if we should handle it, or how much time this questions should take. Will it be beneficial for our students?

Karl: We also had to learn to say no. We sometimes had to say “Yeah, this is a really good idea, but we don’t have the resources or the structure in place to prioritize it.” It’s very sad - we have to adapt and accept that we can’t do everything.

When you think back to last summer: have your goals and visions evolved?

Cornelia: I still want us to be a more visible organization for our members. I want them to feel not just belonging to their chapters, but to THS as well. That is still the core of what I think should be worked on.

Karl: I agree with that. I want THS to have more of a presence in students’ life! Not everything is in place for that to happen - we need to work on our internal communication and structure to have the right conditions.

What do you think are your biggest achievements during this year?

Cornelia: KL (the Management Team) is my biggest achievement, I'm very proud of them! Everyone has achieved something, but I feel like everyone has grown personally as well. We haven't always agreed on everything, but we've had an open climate where people can express their opinions. We have also (almost) achieved anonymous exams, we have introduced a new KTH President, that’s huge! We’ve been a part of a lot of good changes at KTH and started building a really good relationship with them!

Cornelia: A lot has been about learning how to be a leader. I've been a boss and a leader before in both my chapter and work life. But THS is a weird mix. It's kind of work, and kind of volunteering. I’ve had to learn to be the boss, set priorities and restrictions, but also create motivation for the people that work here because they think it's fun. Is a very fine balance.

Would you do it again if you could?

Cornelia: Yes. I would do it in a different way, but I don't regret it for a second. It’s been one of the best experiences I’ve ever had. In a fun way, but also in a learning-about-myself way!

Karl: I thought about this yesterday actually. It kind of sucks to go and search for a job in the economic situation we're in now.. but no, I would definitely do it again. Without question.

Cornelia: One of the things I'm most proud of is how you and I have worked together. We’ve had a very open and honest relationship from day one.. The first time we met after we were elected, I said “Alright, tell me the worst things about you that I need to know!” And we’ve always been able to talk about it when we disagree.. Can you tell which one of us is the more sentimental?

Karl: Yeah, but I'm probably the one who's going to be crying on our last day!

cAMpUS HEJ DÅ, PRESIDIUM!

SLÄPP IN OSS!

Corona är äntligen över, studenterna är tillbaka på Campus! Föreläsningar, fester och företagsevent

är tillbaka - fast inte helt. Efter pandemin har det blivit svårt att hitta lokaler till företagsevent och KTH säger blankt nej till att använda nyrenoverade föreläsningssalar till lunchföreläsningar.

lokaler är bra, men att en felprioritering görs om dessa lokaler blir så upprustade att man inte kan äta i dem; poängen med att rusta upp lokaler är att de ska fungera väl för sitt ändamål, och lunchföreläsningar har länge varit en viktig del av det ändamålet.

Det finns också en godtycklighet i när mat får ätas i lokalerna: på kursföreläsningar är det inte ett problem, och smaskandet ekar högt mellan de matematiska bevisen. Men när studenterna arrangerar event så är mat förbjudet för att det ”sliter” på lokalen. Studenter är slasar verkar det tyckas. Att vi från kårens sida kommer med förslag som pricksystem, bokningsavgifter eller städböter biter inte utan möts med oförståelse och intrycket vi får är att KTH inte litar på studenterna.

Ser vi oss om i landet har andra universitet inte samma problem. På både LinTek i Linköping och på Uppsala Universitet får studenterna låna föreläsningssalar till lunchföreläsningar utan kostnad. De universiteten tolkar det som en del av högskoleförordningens krav på att studentorganisationer ska få använda universitetets lokaler (Förordning 1998:1003).

Som en student så fint sa i en av våra undersökningar: ”för en lyckad lunchföreläsning måste det förstås finnas lunch”, och sedan en tid tillbaka har vi studenter blivit begränsade till endast V1, V2, V3 och U-hallen (som inte är möblerad) när lunch ska serveras. De lokalerna har gemensamt är att ingen är tillräckligt stor för de lunchföreläsningar företagen efterfrågar.

Den största av V-salarna har kapacitet för max 90 personer, medan många företag önskar sig minst 100 gäster på sina föreläsningar. Samtidigt meddelar sektionerna att de inte har några problem med att fylla en lunchföreläsning med fler studenter än så och att tillgång till

större lokaler skulle skapa förutsättningar för samarbeten mellan sektioner och föreläsningar med uppåt 150 gäster.

Det känns som att en lösning inte är långt borta. Tillgång till en eller två stora lokaler (som tar över 120 gäster) utöver de som finns nu skulle lösa problemet. Användningen av dessa skulle kunna roteras för att jämna ut påverkan, en viss avgift för användningen skulle kunna tas ut och ett system för att garantera varsam hantering av lokalerna skulle kunna implementeras.

Men låt oss stanna här och säga tack. Tack KTH för de fräscha och trevliga lokaler som ni renoverat upp! Vi tycker att upprustade

KTH har förutom att följa högskoleförordningen mycket att vinna på att skapa bra förutsättningar för THS näringslivsarbete på sektionerna. Studenternas framtid påverkas mycket av företagen de träffar på campus, och KTH:s varumärke bygger på att studenterna blir framgångsrika efter examen. Intrycket av att komma till Campus och möjligheten att träffa studenter påverkar också företagens bild av KTH; ett KTH som visar sig från sin finaste, nyrenoverade, sida förstärker bilden av KTH som ett av världens främsta universitet.

Så: kära KTH, ge oss förutsättningarna för att hålla bra lunchföreläsningar med intressanta företag. Ge oss tillgång till ytterligare två stora föreläsningssalar och arbeta med oss för att sätta upp rutiner för hur de ska skötas.

TEXT ERIK NORDLÖF & LEONARD HÖKBY FOTO BENJAMIN JAVITZ

Tack, Sven!

Under 37 år har Sven lyst upp tillvaron i KårX och hjälpt KTH:s studenter, alltid med glimten i ögat! Nu går han i pension.