Tsanko Kunchev
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Alumnus Job Organizations Graduated Degree programme Faculty Time of interview |
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Why did you decide to study International Relations at Rhine-Waal University?
I wouldn’t say that there was one particular reason why because I didn’t just wake up one morning and think like, “I should go study International Relations (IR) in Kleve!” I didn’t even know the city existed before I applied. There’s a lot of reasons combined. First, I wanted to study abroad. I picked Germany because I know it’s famous for good education and the semester fees are quite low compared to the UK or Italy. Also, I really enjoyed the idea of being in central Europe where you’re in one country, but also close to all of the other Western countries. It made visiting and traveling really easy. Then, I chose International Relations because I’ve been passionate and interested in developing my local community in Burgas, Bulgaria since high school. It’s a city on the Black Sea and because it’s also a summer resort, it lacks activities during the rest of the year. Ever since high school, me and my friends have been trying to find ways to develop the local community. IR came as an idea, because it offers more of an interdisciplinary approach to solving problems. It’s the study of how a situation is connected: the environmental parts, the social parts, the political parts, and the economic parts. The combination of all these things resulted in the Burgas I knew growing up, and as it is now. That’s why I chose IR as a degree programme, and Rhine-Waal University is the only place in Germany that offers the degree in English. My German was not, and still is not, particularly good.
What was the topic of your bachelor’s thesis?
Actually, it’s very funny, but I was considering writing about a completely different topic at first. I wanted to write about transnational corporations and the idea of sovereignty. After my internship, which I did at the European Solidarity Corps in Italy, I had a meeting with my supervisor, Professor Brand. I told him about my thesis idea about my plan. He was like, “that’s not a very good idea because it’s way too big for a bachelor’s thesis. You cannot put all of that into 50 pages.” During the meeting, he asked me what I plan to do in the future with the experience of the internship and I explained to him that I wanted to start my own association, i.e. my own NGO, back home to work with young people together with the local infrastructure. Professor Brand suggested writing my bachelor’s thesis on exactly that. So, my bachelor's thesis was about the benefits of establishing a non-governmental organization to address the lack of youth social infrastructure in the Burgas region of Bulgaria. My findings confirmed my prior opinion and my thoughts on this topic turned out to be quite true. I learned there are specific reasons for the region’s problems, but I also got a good idea of how I could address them and what kinds of activities and projects would be best.
What were your next steps after graduating from Rhine-Waal?
As I mentioned, I did my internship in the south of Italy and that kicked off my “Italian adventure”. After finishing my bachelor's degree, I returned to Italy because six months in Italy was definitely not enough. I went for another year to the north of Italy, to a small town near Bergamo, to work with kids from immigrant and refugee families. That was a nice experience, very pleasant and fun. I would help them after school with homework and similar things. When Covid hit, I decided to return to Bulgaria. I was really passionate about working locally in Burgas, so when I returned, I instantly started the association that I envisioned in my bachelor’s thesis. Not only are we still around today, we’ve grown: we now have a team of six people responsible for different areas like PR, logistics etc. We just had a joint project with the municipal government, a youth festival, and now we’re starting a project funded by Erasmus+, which is a mixture between entertainment and green activities.
I also started privately tutoring, which led to me founding my own academy. I teach math and English, and totally by chance I ended up finding a very good niche for myself: Bulgarian parents living in other countries, because lots of them are looking for Bulgarian tutors for their kids. I am currently running the academy alone, but starting this school year I’m hiring another person to take over lessons from me.
Besides that, I’ve done many things over the years since graduating, particularly internships, e.g. in social media, marketing and event management. At one point I was working as a project manager for the Bulgarian Biodiversity Foundation, which is one of the biggest ecological NGOs in Bulgaria. So, I managed to acquire lots of knowledge and experience from here and there, which eventually led to me starting and developing my own projects with the academy and the association.
What do you enjoy most about your work?
It’s diverse. I don’t get bored. All those different activities on a daily basis, meeting with all sorts of different people. Even if we only speak about my students, it’s a bunch of very different people and we cover lots of different topics, especially when I’m helping them with English, because it’s mostly having conversations. We talk about investment strategies or computer science – basically whatever interests them. But it’s always different.
Where do you see yourself in 10 years?
To be honest, I don’t know. I believe I’m on a very good path right now. It’s very sustainable and rewarding trying to make changes at the local level. I also believe that “big picture changes” are more realistic if they start at the local level in many different places at the same time. I guess I will probably still be doing the same kinds of things that I’m doing now locally, just better and bigger.
Do you have any advice for current and prospective IR students?
IR is very interesting to study, but it’s mostly theoretical, and doesn’t give you many practical skills that you would apply to an actual job. Considering that, I would advise you to always seize an opportunity to volunteer, whether doing an internship, organizing an event for AStA, working in student parliament or anything else – just go do it. It’s always a very valuable experience, even if it doesn’t pay money. All these experiences will link together at some point eventually, even if you don’t see the connection between them at first. They make you a better professional, someone who can do a bit of this and that, and sometimes just being aware of different areas and fields can come in handy. So, that would be my advice: just do things, be proactive. Also, attend all of Mr Bauer’s lectures because his exams are really challenging.
Looking back, what is your favourite memory of your time as a student at Rhine-Waal?
Difficult question because I wouldn’t say that it’s one memory in particular. I would say that the most valuable thing that I took from Rhine-Waal is that I really got used to being around very different people from all over the world with different customs, different ideas and different mentalities. I would say that this experience made me more respectful and accepting towards differences. I recall a lot of different international events that I attended during my time in Kleve, but there was one in particular that I remember most. Once, by the canal, there was a house organizing a 24-hour party. There were so many cool people hanging around, playing guitar and at one point, in the evening, we were even chasing fireflies. That experience sticks out in particular, but I would say it’s just one representation of the broader diversity at HSRW.