Meet the new board

At the last general division meeting in Tilburg, DWARS Brabant elected a new board! Nicky van Wanrooij (22) was unanimously elected as the new chairman. He thus succeeds Sinyuan Zhu. 

Nicky is joined on the board by secretary Thomas Dortmans (19) from Deurne, treasurer Shaye Olij (19) from Tilburg and general board members Myrte Hesselberth (19) from Oisterwijk and Louana van Nistelrooij (20) from Tilburg.

In this article, each board member will briefly introduce themselves.

Board photo (from left to right): Thomas Dortmans, Louana van Nistelrooij, Nicky van Wanrooij, Shaye Olij and Myrte Hesselberth.

Nicky van Wanrooij - chairman

Nicky lives in Tilburg and studies at the Fontys Dutch teacher training college there. He previously served as secretary of the section and was in position 8 of GroenLinks's candidate list in the Provincial Council elections.

Nicky has been a member of DWARS for four years now and wants to use that experience to create substantively strong activities together with his board members. Internally, he wants to connect the old generation of members with new members. Externally, he wants to propagate the social, green and liberal ideals as much as possible. He hopes that young people who feel attracted to this will join our association.

For DWARS, Nicky is also on the candidates' committee. In his spare time, he enjoys going to festivals and to PSV.

Thomas Dortmans - secretary

Thomas had been secretary for the past six months, and was re-elected for another year at the AAV. He lives in Deurne and studies Sustainable Innovation at Eindhoven University of Technology. Within DWARS, he is also active nationally, including on the Energy, Sustainability and Mobility committee. He is also active in the student team Team Energy, study association Intermate and student debate association Chronos.

Thomas is looking forward to next year, and together with the board he would like to organise a greater variety of activities, such as excursions, workshops and more theme nights, and thus put DWARS Brabant completely on the map!

Shaye Olij - treasurer

Shaye studies Economics in Tilburg at Tilburg University, and has been living in Tilburg for almost one year now. Despite not having been active in DWARS before, she is very keen and confident. Shaye is also active in the study association Asset | Economics, where she gained experience in terms of committee/board duties. 

Shaye is looking forward to a great collaboration with the other board members. Together with their experience within DWARS and Shaye's fresh perspective, she hopes to put up fun and educational activities that will attract both old and new members. 

Louana van Nistelrooij - general board member

Louana studies Technical Business Administration at the Avans, and has been living in Tilburg for just under three years. Besides studying, she is active within her student union. She has been a member of DWARS for over three years and has since attended a variety of activities and get-togethers.

Louana is really looking forward to making it a fun, inspiring and educational year at DWARS Brabant.

Myrte Hesselberth - general board member

Myrte is from Oisterwijk, where she has been on the city council for PrO since 2018. She is also studying SPECO Sports Communication at the Fontys Economics College Tilburg. 

She loves football and is an avid Ajax supporter. Her biggest political frustration is inequality between people and the climate problem. She is committed to DWARS Brabant as board member Communication and hopes to reach every DWARSer in Brabant.