Why did you decide to apply to organise this event?

We believe that organizing an event for our network means a lot for a section, not just in terms of visibility but also in terms of skills, and can contribute to the growth of the section to a great extent. For example, while organizing this event we had the chance to put our new members in charge of some aspects such as pick ups and logistics, the skills they learned will be helpful also in the section daily life, when we welcome Erasmus and International students in our university; other aspects such as budgeting, communication and relationships with external partners had a great impact on the knowledge transfer between the old and the new local board of our section. Finally, during the event, all the section member had the occasion to make team building and to meet other people from the network.

How big was your team? Was it easy to find helpers?

ESN Chieti Pescara in the last few years had a significative growth in terms of volunteers, this year we have more than 30 between active members and newbies. The main OC was composed by 10 people, namely the 2017/18 and the 2018/19 local boards, and was in charge of thinking and organizing the event. During the event other 10/15 volunteers of the section participated and carried out various task such as coffee break preparation, assistance to the Eduk8 team and to the participants, and social activities preparation.

What was the most rewarding part of the event?

It is not possible to spot just one thing as the most rewarding part of the event. We were really happy to see that all the participants, the trainer and the eduk8ers were happy at the end of the event. We were more than pleased to see that nothing went wrong and that we were able to carry out a great event. We are quite sure that food was the real deal as this is one of the main aspects in which we usually struggle during ESN events, and this was one of our main concerns: we knew that hungry participants are angry participants, so lack of food would not have had a good impact on the training and we wanted to avoid that. We think we managed in doing so and the feedback from the participants at the end of the event were very rewarding on this aspect.

And last but not least, why should a section apply to organise an Eduk8 event?

Because it’s a different kind of event and a more challenging one, for this reason at the end it become it more rewarding and satisfying. The main challenges are the number of participants, the amount of days, logistic details and materials that are asked and these can make you panic at the beginning. To solve this puzzles you need to be creative and to develop a lot of skills such as patience and mediation ability, this makes the section and the OC member grow. Also an Eduk8 event is not a usual ESN event such as a National Platform, this means you are out of your comfort zone that is, basically, what ESN is about. Last but not least, during event you will meet a lot of beautiful people, you will see their smiles between the activities and, at the end of the event, you will see how thankful they are in you behalf. These three things alone are worth to organize an Eduk8 event!