Growing up in Crawfordsville, Andrew Gonczarow ’22 remembers having serious doubts about staying in town after high school.
But with a little push from his grandfather and alum, Jack Wyatt ’58, Gonczarow submitted an application, took a tour of campus, and fell in love with Wabash College.
“The first day of orientation, when I met the student leader, Kyle Warbinton ’20, I remember he was someone I could look up to as a role model, who really cared, and was there to help,” Gonczarow said. “I wanted to be the same for other students.”
During his time at Wabash, Gonczarow has distinguished himself through a variety of campus leadership roles. The economics major is a new student orientation manager and alumni relations chair of Beta Theta Pi. He has also a served member of the Center for Innovation, Business, and Entrepreneurship (CIBE), COVID Action, Response, and Education (CARE) Team, TEDx, College Mentors for Kids, Student Senate and the Dean‘s Presidents Council.
Out of the long list of positions Gonczarow has held, his favorite over the years has been serving as the 99th president of the Sphinx Club.
With the 127th Monon Bell Classic marking Gonczarow’s last week as Sphinx Club president, we caught up with the senior to learn more about what drew him to the organization, some of his favorite memories, and goals for life after Wabash.
Q: For someone new to Wabash, how would you explain Sphinx Club?
Sphinx Club is a leadership organization on campus that consists of students from all living units. We have two main goals: to promote campus unity and to represent Wabash College, whether that be during a campus tour, a football game, or other events.
Members of Sphinx Club are some of the most involved students on campus. These guys are awesome and work really hard to make an impact. They are the ones who are always asking, ‘What’s happening on campus? What do you need? What can we do to help?’
Q: What were your goals as president? What accomplishments are you proud of?
A lot of our members and students across campus missed out on events and experiences over the last year-and-a-half because of the pandemic. That was really hard and disappointing, so my goal for this school year was to celebrate being in-person and bring everyone back together.
Sphinx Club celebrated its centennial last semester. We hosted a week of celebration events on campus, and it was really fun to see and a good way to send the seniors out who weren’t really able to have a normal year.
Q: You’re so close to passing on the torch to the next president. How does that feel?
Being president has been very fun and I’ve had a good time bringing students together. It’s also going to be one of those things that I am going to miss and feel a little disappointed that I didn’t accomplish even more because of COVID and health restrictions.
With this position, I really learned a lot about accountability and responsibility. There can be a lot of pressure that goes into leading a club that has lasted on campus for 100 years. I also learned a lot about communication and working together as a team. Sphinx Club is only successful because we have a lot of great people working together to make it happen. The members made the job easier for me. When you have good members who are just as committed to the mission, it makes a world of difference.
Q: What are your favorite memories with Sphinx Club?
Chapel Sing this year was really fun. It was kind of stressful for me because I had to be the one that kept things organized, took classes to get judged, and made sure rules were followed properly. But compared to last year’s, it was really nice to be able to see everyone on the mall in front of the Chapel and get back that sense of normalcy. It was awesome to experience the same kind of Chapel Sing that I had my freshman year. We’ve kept the tradition going.
Q: What are your plans after graduation?
This is a tough one. I am currently still looking around at possible jobs or pursing grad school. If things are nice and line up, the dream goal is to work on a sales or marketing team for a professional sports team or company. Realistically, I plan to find a job for a company in Indianapolis where I can work for a year or so and get used to being an adult in the business world.