Olga Pullens

Posted On 06/12/2022

Interview By Pete Ho Ching Fung

→ Could you describe your role as the student counsellor?

I have an independent position within the school, it is directly beneath the Executive Board and everything students discuss with me is confidential. Together with Mona Smits, we are the Care team and we support individual students, whether it is about disabilities or study limitations. It can be personal, medical, family related, etc.

I also transfer students to specialist care, or assist students when special facilities are needed (access to the workshops for example). There is also the Student Charter. It is under the Dutch law if people have legal, housing or financial issues, for example if you need a file a request for the Examination Board, or when you have an internal disagreement within the school, I can help navigate the procedures. I can tell you where to go. I am the spider in the web of internal and external networks.

I am here to foster the common interest of students. So when I hear many students telling me the same thing at any given time, I go to the coordinators or the heads of the departments or the Executive Board to raise some of those issues.

“I understand from within what’s happening, because I was there myself.”

→ What’s your background, and what lead you to this role?

I did so many things. I did art school in Den Bosch, at that time it was called the Royal Art School, and now it is called AKV St. Joost School of Art & Design. I did ceramics there and after that I have always had my own studios. I worked at the school under the ceramics department, and I did a first degree in teaching.

What happened was that when I worked at AKV, Design Academy Eindhoven students would come to me on Wednesdays because the ceramics department there was fantastic. I really liked those DAE students so I just called DAE and said I wanted to work with them. So I became the head of all the mechanical workshops here.

I always have an interest in art students, I always have this connection with them. I was always talking to them. Shortly after starting at DAE, I had a colleague who was then the counsellor, who was leaving, and he asked if counselling is something I could do. Then the rest is history. I am a trained mediator and I am also a certified coach. And I understand from within what’s happening, because I was there myself.

→ Do you have a design practice outside of Design Academy?

I hide it a bit and many students do not know about it - I have been a diehard ceramist for 35 years. I make functional and also sculptural pieces. When COVID started, I gave myself an assignment to make 100 objects with a cube, a frame and a bowl. Now I am at number 53.

So I am a model maker and I work with moulds a lot, so I can make everything myself. I am also in a collective, and we have our ovens together in Den Bosch, there is an old factory called Gruyterfabriek&nbspand that’s where our studio is.

“I really like when students come to me and tell me what they need because I do not always know.”

→ Over your 15 years at the Academy, what are some of the challenges you have, and continue to encounter?

That's a difficult question. I think the most important for me is to be accessible. It sounds easy but being accessible without pre-assumptions is difficult. How to be visible, how to make ourselves available and communicate the intentions behind things; these are challenges I face. For me, we are all human after all. To make sure people are heard, it needs to be done as a whole. I try to make myself available and sometimes, I also do not know if I am doing the right things. I really like when students come to me and tell me what they need because I do not always know. If there is something wrong - come tell me.

→&nbsp Where can students find you?

I work three days a week: Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. I am at the Academy 9-5 and of course students can email me at . I get back to them as soon as I can.