RIT Croatia communities at Dubrovnik and Zagreb campuses collected close to 35.000,00 kn for charity purposes!

Traditional Charity Auctions started off the Holiday Season in high spiRIT!

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Holiday Season, the favorite time of the year for many people, started off at RIT Croatia with traditional Charity Auctions that took place November 17 in Zagreb at the Johann Franck, and November 24 in Dubrovnik at the Culture Club Revelin.

Both events were run by Student Government members, which was another great opportunity for them to showcase their organizational skills. When asked what makes this event different as oppose to other college events, Sven Kovačević, the President of Student Government for both campuses commented: "At RIT Croatia the Student Government organizes a wide variety of events, all of which are benefiting the students in one way or another. But what makes this event different from others is that we unite all members of our community, from students to faculty and staff, as well as Alumni and their families, to work together and help raise as much money as possible for a good cause in order to help us give back to the community and to the less fortunate ones". Niko Katušić, Vice President of Student Government at the Dubrovnik campus calls this event a "character builder" and emphasizes the value of being able to set everything else aside and to help others that are in need.

When asked how they chose the recipients of this donation Sven said that the Zagreb team looked into various factors such as the purpose of the organization, whom do they help, and most importantly, how can this donation be used. The mutual decision was to use the donation for purchasing equipment for the education and development of youth and children at the "Centar za odgoj i obrazovanje Dubrava" in Zagreb. The Student Government members at the Dubrovnik campus usually prefer to choose individuals as donation recipients but this year they decided to choose the association "Zajedno do Zdravlja" from Dubrovnik. This association deals with improving childhood and quality of life for chronically ill children, and in agreement with the association, students decided to use the donation for purchasing much need inhalers for children.

Event organization has a process of its own regardless of whether the event is for charity or for profit. In both cases, there are multiple complex layers that all need to fall in place for the event to run flawlessly. And the preparation often starts months prior to the event, which was the case with our Charity Auctions as well. Along the way, there are always challenges to overcome. Sven looks at teamwork as the most challenging part of organizing this event because it is not easy to synchronize student schedules, as well as motivating students to participate with donations of items. Niko had the same challenges at the Dubrovnik campus and he claims that it was a challenge to educate students on the importance of participating without the "what's in it for me" attitude. This shows that there is an educational piece behind organizing such an event with the purpose of raising awareness about the importance of giving back to the community, which is equally important as the actual charity donation itself.

However, in the eyes of the Student Government members, the rewarding aspect of organizing such an event is so gratifying that all challenges instantly fade away. "The rewarding part of the auction was stepping out on the stage and seeing so many people who are willing to help others and seeing the high level of engagement from all members of the Student Government team working together. The most rewarding part was when we announced that we collected close to 20.000,00 kn! Wow, I could not believe we managed to get to this amount, which is the highest amount ever collected at RIT Croatia auctions. It made me feel so proud thinking about how we will be able to purchase a significant amount of needed inhalers for the association "Zajedno do Zdravlja"", said Niko. Sven agrees with his fellow Student Government member that the most rewarding moment was the end result, and the fact that 15.000,00 kn was collected for "Centar za odgoj i obrazovanje Dubrava", which is a very impressive amount to say the least.

The entire organization process was a huge learning experience for our students. As the leader of the Dubrovnik Student Government team in organizing this event, Niko believes that the skill he managed to improve in this process was the ability to step away and to enable other team members to take ownership as well. As Niko said "at the end, good teamwork is what leads the leader to success and what makes events like this happen. Being that all team members are responsible for success, it is also good to acknowledge those individuals that did their best even outside of their areas of responsibility". Sven claims he used a lot of the knowledge and skills he has acquired over the years at RIT Croatia while working on this event. "The most important skills I used were definitely my leadership and organization skills. To lead the SG into the right direction and to get them to use their full potential was a key factor in organizing this event. As for my organization skills, without them this wouldn't have been possible. To organize this event I had to juggle many different tasks at all times, and to monitor if everyone is doing what they were supposed to. But with the help of the entire team and our supervisors, we were able to get everything done", said Sven.

Once again, RIT Croatia can proudly applaud to the enthusiastic and driven Student Government teams at both campuses, as well as to all members of RIT Croatia community that participated in this year's Charity Auctions. We are looking forward to many more events with this kind of selfless and giving spiRIT in the future!