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Our Booth Student Advisory Council Leadership Experience

Leaders of the Student Advisory Council tell us about exciting events they’ve planned, both past and future.

Meet three leaders of Chicago Booth’s Part-Time MBA Student Advisory Council (SAC) and learn about the many events they’ve recently led and what they are currently excited about.

Bilal Baqar –  Lead Platform Engineer at the Centre for translational data science, University of Chicago
 
Ty Kaptizky –  Senior Associate, Strategic Finance at SoFi
 
Sid Prakash –  Manager, Data Analytics at HSBC

Bilal

Bilal Baqar –  Outreach Chair

Responsibilities in SAC
Outreach Committee: Responsible for supporting collaboration with Full-Time and Executive MBA Programs at Booth, the greater UChicago committee, and other business schools.
 
I represent the Part-Time MBA students on the UChicago Graduate Council, which is the representative student government of the 9000+ graduate students at UChicago. I am also in the Graduate Council’s Committee on elections. The committee is responsible for conducting free and fair elections for positions like the liaison to the board of trustees.
 
What events have you run over the past months or are planning for in the future?
My focus has been on identifying new avenues for outreach and establishing relationships with key stakeholders that can be beneficial for the Part-Time student community in the long-run. I have connected SAC with the Part-Time student government at Kellogg and we have a student mixer for both schools coming up this month. I have also connected SAC with the Student Partnership Council (SPC), which is the student government of Booth’s Executive MBA Program, and are planning a mixer with them in March as well.  
 
I advocate for the best interests of Booth’s student body. As the representative of Part-Time MBA students at the Graduate Council, I have conveyed our stance on important matters like the safety and security of students, the effect of remote learning modalities on students, and universities policies and response to COVID. I also ensure that Part-Time students attend Graduate Council events. In the Fall Quarter, we had our annual Gargoyle Gala and a winter social planned at Rock Bottom Brewery.
 
I am also the co-chair of the Outdoors Club and am working with SAC to introduce a summer trip this year, which will be the Part-Time community’s second largest outdoors event alongside the annual ski trip.

Why did you choose to get involved with SAC?
My Booth experience wouldn't have been complete without engaging in activities outside the classroom. Social events provided great opportunities to socialize, meet new people and just have fun, but I wanted to be part of the team that organized them. SAC provided a great opportunity for me to work with like-minded people who wanted to give back to the Booth community.

I saw outreach as a good committee to start with because there is a lot of flexibility on what I could work on and no ceiling to what I could do. It was a great opportunity to network with interesting people across different avenues. I had already been affiliated with the UChicago community for three years, so I knew I could definitely succeed in this role and give back to the Part-Time community.

Ty K

Ty Kapitzky –  Signature Events Co-Chair

Responsibilities in SAC
I manage our large-scale signature events from start to finish, including Booth’s Boat Cruise, Winter Formal, Cubs games, and more.
 
What events have you run over the past months or are planning for in the future?
We had the boat cruise a few months ago, which was the first event Booth has hosted in a very long time. It was awesome to get everyone together again and spend an evening out on Lake Michigan. We also just had our Winter Formal at Navy Pier, which was a huge success! Next up, is our Spring Formal that was originally intended for January but got rescheduled. We are also planning on a Cubs game outing in May.
 
Why did you choose to get involved with SAC?
I was involved with Student Government in undergrad, and loved the widespread impact you can directly have to better the student experience.

Chicago Booth Evening MBA student Sid Prakash

Sid Prakash –  LAUNCH Chair
 
Responsibilities in SAC
I am responsible for enabling a smooth transition to student life for the incoming student cohorts and building the required frameworks to ensure the student onboarding experience is consistent across quarters. To achieve this, I work closely with the Student Life Team, the Leadership Development Office, and a passionate set of student mentors to engage with incoming students each quarter. The engagement begins when students accept their offer of admission and continues until the incoming students complete their first quarter at Chicago Booth.
 
What events have you run over the past months or are planning for in the future?
I manage LAUNCH, which occurs a few weeks before the start of each quarter. Since Fall 2021, we have conducted LAUNCH as both an in-person and virtual event to accommodate the schedules of the incoming cohort. The in-person LAUNCH is spread over two days. The first day involves onboarding events, meeting with mentors, a city-wide scavenger hunt, and a social. The second day features a full day LEAD session that includes an improv workshop and a module that student mentors help facilitate. The virtual LAUNCH features a virtual social where student mentors connect with students who are starting remote.
 
Any thoughts, learnings, or highlights from these events?
The most rewarding aspect of LAUNCH is to see the incoming students and mentors bonding over the course of the weekend. The mentors are well established members and leaders in the Booth community with a strong desire to give back and there is a noticeable buzz of energy and excitement through the weekend. Communication is key in this SAC role and every additional bit of effort put in contributes to making the experience better for the incoming students and mentors alike.
 
Why did you choose to get involved with SAC?
Involvement was my way of paying it forward and contributing to the growth of the incredible student community at Chicago Booth. I had a wonderful set of mentors when I went through LAUNCH and this made me realize the criticality of the student mentor role and the importance of making the Student-mentor experience consistent. By taking on the role of a LAUNCH Chair, I wanted to strengthen the framework for the selection, onboarding, and coaching of student mentors and optimize the interactions with mentors so the incoming students had a smooth transition to life at school.

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