Less than a month ago, a new AEGEE Contact was born. This time in Sheffield, the UK. Four girls are behind this, they dream big and have already done some things with the brand new contact. We asked them a few questions so we can find out more about them and their plans.

The AEGEEan: Tell us a little bit about yourself.

AEGEE Contact in Sheffield: We are four girls from different corners of Europe – Hanna from Finland, Anne-Sophie from the Netherlands, Chiara from Italy and Oksana from Ukraine. We are all students at the University of Sheffield, which is offering us a lot of support. We are all here only for either a semester or a year, which is not ideal but we will hand over our antenna to the future generation with pleasure!

What other people are behind this new local?

Hanna, Anne-Sophie and Oksana have already been active in AEGEE – in Helsinki, Maastricht and Kyiv respectively. So we met through common friends – AEGEE networking does work in reality! Chiara is new to AEGEE and is inspired to experience Summer Universities. Although we all met less than two months ago, it already feels like a great team. We have also found enthusiastic new members who are eager to help us out, which is fantastic!

Why a contact for AEGEE in Sheffield even if it had struggles in the past?

Well, we felt like this city fits AEGEE perfectly! The students’ community is great here with lots of people from all around the world. We knew about struggles in the past of course, but we have gotten many positive reactions so far, so we feel like we can definitely make it. The good thing is that three of us were already quite experienced in AEGEE, so a lot of things were easier for us like presentations and promotion.

How many members do you have now and how did people in the city react to the association?

Last week, we had a meeting promoting Summer Universities and recruiting new members. It went even better than we expected, so by now, we have 14 members! There is a lot of activity besides AEGEE in Sheffield, as the Students’ Union here is exceptionally active so people never get bored. However, we do have something special to offer, so our aim is to expand and to prove that we can be a successful local!

What is your strategy to get the contact known in your city and get more people involved in it?

For now, we are focusing on the promotion of Summer Universities as we were lucky enough to jump onto the AEGEE boat when our fresh members can still apply for this great project. Therefore, our aim is to make new members that apply for Summer University and also are enthusiastic about becoming active locally. The strategy which worked best so far is to share stories about AEGEE among our friends in Sheffield, which motivates them to join and experience it all themselves!

What are your plans for the near future?

During the last weekend of March, we had a party to celebrate the birth of our contact – with the birthday cake of course! Some members from the UK antennas came as well, so it was a great chance to bring some AEGEE-spirit to Sheffield! Other than that, the next step is to get upgraded to Contact-Antenna at Agora Enschede and we are working hard on it!

We wish them all the best of luck!

You can find them on Facebook here!

Written by Raluca Radu, AEGEE-Cluj-Napoca

Recently more and more contacts have been set up in the United Kingdom. After Manchester and Newcastle upon Tyne already joined the AEGEE family, it was announced in February that there was another addition in the city of Aberdeen, Scotland. We spoke to Joona Juntunen to find out more about the newest contact!

From left to right: Michela (Italy), Julieth (Venezuela), Carlota (Portugal),
Sára (Czech Republic), Joona (Finland) & Michaela (Czech Republic)

The AEGEEan: How did you know about AEGEE-Europe?

Joona: Each of us got to know about AEGEE slightly differently. I heard about it first from my cousin who is an active member in AEGEE-Helsinki. Michela has already been part of AEGEE in her home city in Italy. And many of course have just now heard about it the first time.

What made you decide to start a contact?

I’ve been previously active in Youth in Action projects of the European Union. For example, last year I was doing European Voluntary Service in Germany. So I was already quite used to taking part in European projects and wanted to continue that after coming to study here in Aberdeen. After hearing about AEGEE, I felt that I had to seize the opportunity. Also I believe that AEGEE can have a positive impact on young people’s attitudes towards Europe here in Britain, which is quite important especially if the referendum on Brexit (a referendum on the British membership of the European Union, promised to take place in 2017, ed.) will take place. Founding a contact is really quite easy. Just being curious, open-minded and willing to take action is enough.

How many people are currently involved?

Around ten people attended the first meeting, from which around five are really active and engaged. Of course we intend to make this number much bigger in the future. It will be challenging to involve local students. So far most of us are from outside the UK.

What are your plans for the upcoming year?

In the long term we hope to establish ourselves as an antenna and organise international events and perhaps Summer Universities. Before that we’d also like to organise a bigger discussion/debate on Europe and the UK in cooperation with other societies. In the short term we are planning some promotional events to get people interested in taking part in international events. As an example we are planning to organise a pub quiz about Europe in a couple of weeks.

How will you promote yourself amongst students?

So far it has been just telling friends and posting something on Facebook. In the future we will use our contacts at other societies and organise publicity events to attract more attention. Also we want to connect with the other university in Aberdeen.

Do you get any support from other AEGEE-locals?

I have been in contact with people active in the contact in Manchester as well as members of AEGEE-Helsinki. This has been fruitful because as a new contact we are starting from zero. Hearing about others’ experiences can help a lot in the beginning. I hope the cooperation will grow in the future!

Written by Svenja van der Tol, AEGEE-Nijmegen

After several new contacts in Russia and Belgium, on the 19th of December it was announced that AEGEE-Europe is also expanding to England with a new contact in Manchester. The AEGEEan spoke to Pablo Palazón, member of AEGEE-Alicante, to find out more about the newest contact!

Pablo Palazón

Pablo Palazón got in contact with AEGEE in 2013, when he became a member of AEGEE-Alicante. “I went to a Summer University in Torino and became quite active. I ended up being the treasurer of the amazing Summer University of AEGEE-Alicante last year!” However, when he moved to Manchester last August, he noticed that there is a big need for organisations fostering Europtimism in the United Kingdom. “I was missing my AEGEE life so much that I decided to start working on the recovery of this AEGEE experience”, he says. “I had so many AEGEE friends wiling to visit me in Manchester too that I just needed to give them a good reason to come here!”

Bryn French

After Pablo met Bryn French, a member of AEGEE-Durham living in Manchester, the two guys agreed to found an AEGEE contact in Manchester. They got in contact with Domitille Simon, who founded the European Union Society in the University of Manchester some weeks before, and started to work together.  Together with the members that the European Union Society already had, the three are full of plans for the upcoming year. “We want to take advantage of the great opportunities that AEGEE offers, so we would be really happy to send people to European events”, Pablo explains. “We will be focused on recruiting members and activating the ones we already have! We are also planning to organise an event in May and open it to the AEGEE network and our Nordic Stars.”

To attract new members, there are plans to be present at the students’ fair that will take place in January at the University of Manchester. “We will organise interesting local events for members and we also want to have a good Summer University campaign”, Pablo says. “The relationship between the UK and Europe is one that is continually debated here, and we believe we can bring some much needed Europtimism!” Luckily, with help from other AEGEE-locals like AEGEE-Alicante, AEGEE-Dresden, AEGEE-London and AEGEE-Sheffield and support from Jorge Sánchez Hernández and Pablo Hernández, the new contact has more than enough support in order to achieve their plans and bring some Europtimism to the United Kingdom again.

Written by Svenja van der Tol, AEGEE-Nijmegen

Although the Comité Directeur Head Office is situated in Belgium, Brussels to be precise, until recently the country had only two AEGEE antenna, namely AEGEE-Brussel/Bruxelles and AEGEE-Leuven. On the 28^th of November this changed, when a new contact in Louvain-la-Neuve was announced. The AEGEEan spoke to Nada Lakkis to find out more about this new Belgian contact.
Before we start talking about the contact and its future, first it is time to look at the history of the city of the newest Belgian contact. It all started in Leuven, where the Catholic University at first only provided lectures in French, one of Belgium’s official languages, but started to provide lectures in Dutch, the other official language of Belgium and the language spoken in Leuven in 1930. In 1962 the French and Dutch sections of the university became autonomous, but Flemish nationalists demanded a division of the university and expressed their resentment at privileges given to French-speaking academic. In June 1968 this dispute was solved by turning the Dutch section of the university into the independent Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, while the French section was moved to the French-speaking part of the province, where a campus called Louvain-la-Neuve was founded for the Université Catholique de Louvain. The city was later build around this campus, although the university still owns the site.

Seeing that Louvain-la-Neuve is completely built around the university, it would come as no surprise that it is full of students and therefore a good place for future AEGEE members to get in contact with AEGEE-Europe. Nada Lakkis was one of them. She found out about AEGEE through her friend Lana Tomic. “She told me about all the experiences she had the opportunity to go through with AEGEE and this made me want to join the adventure. I lately found myself passionate by the kind of European dream we have the chance to experience here, during our university time, with the mobility programs and other EU-linked cultural opportunities. This interest made me want to get involved in a student union or project related to Europe, but this is when I discovered that such initiative was sadly lacking in the, however very international, student town of Louvain-la-Neuve.”

Nada turned to AEGEE-Brussel/Bruxelles, who answered her and the idea for the founding of a new contact in Louvain-la-Neuve quickly rose. “After discussing it with enthusiastic AEGEE-Brussel/Bruxelles and Comité Directeur members, I was glad to find support for the plan, which I immediately implemented by finding a motivated team of students”, said Nada. Right now, the core of this team is made up of eight active members, but the complete group consists of fourteen members. Although still a small group, they already have some plans for the upcoming year! “We would like to start with the organization of conferences in the university, in collaboration with other institutions here, as we think this is also a great way to make the association better known among students”, Nada states. Next to these conferences, the group wants to organize cultural activities and a visit to the European Parliament.

However, the plans aren’t limited to activities only. “We are definitely going to use social media, as this is probably the most powerful tool for any kind of promotion nowadays.” The new contact already has some great plans, and luckily also a lot of support from AEGEE-Brussel/Bruxelles. “I think their enthusiasm and sympathy has somehow been a catalyst for the initiative and now that the contact is created, they’re still willing to assist us. I sincerely appreciate it, and I’m looking forward to meeting new locals too.”

Written by Svenja van der Tol, AEGEE-Nijmegen

After Contacts in Tyumen and Yekaterinburg were added to the Network, on the 28^th of November yet another contact in Russia was announced: Yaroslavl. The AEGEEan spoke to Evgenii Potapov to find out more about the newest addition to the Network!

Evgenii found out about AEGEE-Europe through a very good friend, who took part in an AEGEE event organized in Azerbaijan. “She came back to Yaroslavl and told me about this amazing student organisation and the opportunities it provides, and I immediately decided to start a contact there!” At the moment of the interview there were only five people involved, but the contact was only open for a week at that time so it can be seen as a good start!

Asked about the plans, Evgenii explains us that the main goals are to sign the Convention d’Adhesion at the Agora and build up a strong, unique (contact) antenna in Yaroslavl. “To achieve this, I have to build a perfect team of at least ten members. I think in the beginning the team will consist of my friend, because they are very active and positive people that I can trust. I have already made a presentation using AEGEE’s Visual Identity, which I will use to present AEGEE at the Yaroslavl State University. I also have some ideas for two local projects, but I won’t talk about it before all the details have been discussed. Yaroslavl is a very old and beautiful city, so why wouldn’t we hold a Summer University here?”

Although only recently started, the new Contact already gets a lot of support from AEGEE-Voronezh and NetCom Natalia Ivleva. Let’s hope we will hear more about Yaroslavl in the upcoming months!

Written by Svenja van der Tol, AEGEE-Nijmegen

After the announcement of the new contact in Tyumen not too long ago, on the 25^th of November it was announced that AEGEE-Europe has yet another Russian contact, this time in Yekaterinburg, which is the fourth-largest city in Russia, located on the border of Europe and Asia. The AEGEEan spoke to Alina Kozlineeva to find out more about this new contact!

Working for one of the universities located in Yekaterinburg, Alina found out about AEGEE through one of her students and decided to start her own contact of AEGEE out of “interest and curiosity”. For now she is the only one involved in the contact, but she has confidence in finding more members to join her soon. She has weekly meetings with students where she can talk to them and promote AEGEE.

Besides promotion and gaining new members, Alina also wants to learn as much as possible about AEGEE, get in contact with the Russian locals and get involved with the “AEGEE life and events”. Right now she is already in contact with one of the Russian locals, namely AEGEE-Voronezh, who are supporting the new contact in Yekaterinburg. Hopefully, soon AEGEE-Europe will have another local in Russia, together with Tyumen of course!

Written by Svenja van der Tol, AEGEE-Nijmegen

On the 22nd of October, it was announced that AEGEE-Europe is going to the east and a new contact in Tyumen has been founded. Being located in Siberia, 1,700 kilometers east of Moscow, this new contact is currently the most eastern outpost of AEGEE, although there had been the more eastern located contacts Tomsk and Vladivostok in the past. These contacts, however, never signed the Convention d’Adhésion, so let’s hope Tyumen will! The AEGEEan spoke to Marina Ulybysheva to find out more about this new contact!

Asked how she first found out about AEGEE-Europe, Marina tells us: “Unfortunately I didn’t know about it when I was a student, dreaming of travelling abroad and having a lot of friends all over the world. I got to know of AEGEE-Europe last year, just before the deadline for application for Summer Universities. A friend of mine told me about it and honestly she just forced me to become a member and to apply for some projects. Now of course I am really happy that I did it! I have already got a lot of friends and was in the amazing SU (St. James’ Way) organized by AEGEE-León”.

Having this great first experience, Marina decided to go home and create something in her own city, Tyumen. “I met with the friend who told me about AEGEE-Europe and we realized that we wanted to have an AEGEE antenna in our city too, but we didn’t have any idea what and how we could do it, what kind of projects we could organize here and whether we really could be responsible for a group of foreigners in our city. This year I understood that I really have a project that could be interesting and I found supporters. So it happened!”.

With around fifteen people involved, of which most are Marina’s own friends, the contact already has some plans. “First of all, we want to become a Contact Antenna and then Antenna of course! I want to organize a SU here too”, Marina tells us. In order to set up projects, volunteers are of course needed, so Marina is negotiating with all universities in Tyumen to have a presentation about AEGEE there, while in the meantime, sharing information about AEGEE and its advantages with anyone she meets.

Luckily, there is already enough support from the Network. “I have never got so many support messages and congratulations from people I don’t know. It is an amazing feeling! As for real help I can say ‘thank you’ to AEGEE-Moskva, AEGEE-Sankt-Peterburg and AEGEE-Voronezh. I hope this is just the beginning!”.

Written by Svenja van der Tol, AEGEE-Nijmegen

Meet the new contact of AEGEE-Europe in The Netherlands: Den Haag (in English – The Hague)!

 “The Hague, also called the International City of Peace and Justice, is a very suitable city for an AEGEE-local. (…) The fact that the Peace Palace, the Humanity House and the Clingendael Institute of International Relations are located in this city gives numerous opportunities to work together with institutions on thematics, attend lectures and workshops, and make ourselves known as a good partner to address the youth of the city. (…) AEGEE could be the link between those young students and all that The Hague has to offer when it comes to teaching them about international relations and human rights.” ( extract from the motivation letter to become a Contact)

The birth of this Contact is a result of the work of the NetCom Team for Dutch speaking locals, meaning Wieke van der Kroef, and her subcommissioners Mathieu Soete, Paul Smits and Marije Arentze.

Marije starts telling this story: “The day right after the Agora, it was my birthday, I received the request from the Faculty Board of the Campus Den Haag, part of Leiden University,with the question if we wanted to start an AEGEE-local there. Fortunately, the four of us stayed in Enschede a little longer, to celebrate the fact that we were chosen as a team and to brainstorm about some ideas for the upcoming year for Wieke’s Activity Plan. We directly started deliberating all possibilities, and making some ideas for cooperation with institutions in The Hague. So right there, while we were all having a big hangover from the Agora, the plans for an AEGEE-Europe contact in Den Haag began to materialise”.

Despite they did not have a thought-out strategy, they did effective guerrilla-promotion and it worked! “We went to Den Haag one afternoon in early September when the introduction festival took place. Paul brought two vertical banners from AEGEE-Enschede, I brought a banner from AEGEE-Leiden, some Summer University (SU) booklets and a map of the Network and Mathieu brought some Project Result Booklets and Key to Europe’s from the Comité Directeur-house. Two board members of AEGEE-Leiden, Boudewijn and Aida, joined us later on and we just tried to talk to as many students as possible and tell them about the work of AEGEE in an enthusiastic way. At the end of the day we had a list of around 30 interested people, and that list has been growing ever since” explains Marije.

Aron Miszlivetz, student of the Bachelor International Studies, and a fresh member, presents how promotion will continue: “Monday we will have a presentation right after the lecture of Dr. Griffiths, where we will explain what AEGEE is, why people should join, and how people can benefit from AEGEE. After that we hope a lot of people will sign in.” This professor appeared to be a big fan of AEGEE, as he recommended it to his students even without being asked to.

Esther van Tveen, also enrolled in the Bachelor of International Studies, points out one of the reasons why our association conquered her and has potential for development: “Our studies fits perfectly with the fields of actions and focus areas of AEGEE, so a lot of students have the right mindset to join AEGEE.”

Despite the city being seat of several international organisations, AEGEE covers a niche that has complements the rest: according to Zaynab Lasshab, “what makes AEGEE different from other organisations is that AEGEE focuses on youth. So AEGEE will be a complementary organisation in Den Haag, because we address the students, and student life is only just starting to develop here.” Plus, as Baykan Yilmaz expresses, “What makes us special is our big Network with antennae all over Europe. We are one of a kind.”

As you could have notice from the names, the interim board includes a diversity of nationalities: from Lithuanian to Hungarian, from Turkish to, of course, Dutch! This is an asset of the contact that could be the starting point for a thematic event. “I am Turkish and I have some experiences with the Turkish Embassy. I know that the Turkish government is making some steps to abolish visa restrictions for students and maybe we can provide our input. We could benefit from all the international institutions in Den Haag to raise the topic of visa problems and organise activities about it. An idea is to set up some kind of a relationship with Turkish locals. Ieva could do the same in Lithuania and Aron in Hungary,” explains Baykan.

Thematic events would not be the only reason to visit The Hague: Zaynab points out the beach and the green heart natural park, supported by Ester saying that: “we are unique because at the same time, there is beautiful nature just around the corner.” Ieva Punyte, with the enthusiasm of someone who has  been in town for just one month adds that “the people here are super friendly, really willing to help if you have a problem. It is really nice to be here, and it is very cosy (gezellig!). And Egbert concludes saying that “I am nice, Esther is smart, Aron looks good and The Hague is an awesome city!”

The future of AEGEE-Europe contact in Den Haag… quite a discussion took place about the name of the soon-to-be-established association. AEGEE-‘s-Gravenhage was the second option: this is the official, historical name of the city and it provides a certain cultural identity. “We decided to let the members vote upon this issue on the first local Agora, and now we are making sure that they are aware of the arguments from both sides in order for them to cast an informed vote,” explains Marije.

The name “Den Haag” resulted as winner: no one in The Hague uses the name ‘s-Gravenhage in a regular conversation and a lot of international students have never heard of it, let alone that they are able to pronounce it!

As you could see already from this article, team-work is a key component of this newly born antenna. In fact, when asked for suggestions about how to establish a Contact, they focus on people: “Find a couple of people and just go to sites and contact people. Spread the word! The more interested people you have, the more ideas you have to share” (Baykan). Also through their experience with AEGEE-Leiden, they can suggest to “Get a good “mama” (or daddy), a mentor from a more established local, who takes care of all the important stuff and makes sure you know what to do” (Egbert).

Becoming a contact antenna was the first step to cut the umbilical cord. Now, the future of AEGEE-Europe contact in Den Haag starts developing by itself and surely it will reach great destinations.

Written by Martina Zanero, AEGEE-Torino

Recently AEGEE-Europe announced that Nicosia is a new shining contact of our Network. This progress is a very positive  step for our AEGEE family.

The reason is – Nicosia is located in Cyprus. Most probably, most of you know that Cyprus is an Mediterranean island which has two communities: Greek and Turkish Cypriots. At the moment there is only one antenna, AEGEE-Mağusa, which is situated on the northern part of the island. Now AEGEE contact in Nicosia has been established in the southern part of the island.

The AEGEEan got in touch with Marios Efthymiou from Nicosia to learn more about them and their future plans.

How did you come to the idea of creating a contact of AEGEE in Nicosia?

I am also the president of another organisation who participated in a youth exchange. One of our partners was an AEGEE antenna and we started to speak about AEGEE. I liked the idea of the organisation and I was very surprised that there was not another one in Cyprus apart from AEGEE-Mağusa.  As we have a lot of students in Cyprus I felt that AEGEE was needed to keep our students active and involved so I started the procedures to establish AEGEE-Nicosia.

What are your future plans connected to AEGEE in Nicosia?

I have many plans for AEGEE-Nicosia.  I hope to unite the students of Cyprus through AEGEE-Nicosia with an abundance of events and activities that are both fun and informative.  Of course we also plan to do projects of a more serious nature.  We will be looking at two main themes over the next year, namely environmental issues and employment issues. For next year we have International Summer Weeks planned for participants all over the world and we are also hoping to have at least one Summer University.  We are already in the process of applying as partners with other organisation in Europe and abroad for youth projects for 2013. We are also planning to undertake a bi-communal project.

Can you describe yourselves and tell us what is special about AEGEE contact in Nicosia so far?

I think the best word to describe us is “active”: we plan to be as active as possible in order to make changes in our community that are so desperately needed.  We already have a good network of partners on an international level and with AEGEE we can do so much more.

How many people are there who started the contact?

There are five people who were active in setting up the future AEGEE-Nicosia but so many more eager future members who contributed in so many ways.

Do you plan to be upgraded during Agora Budapest?

If this is possible then yes, we will do everything in our power to go as far as we can with AEGEE-Nicosia.

What do you think about the cooperation with AEGEE-Mağusa in terms of any kind of projects?

I am very interested in this cooperation and as mentioned above I already have some ideas for bi-communal projects and it is our hope that we can be partners with AEGEE-Mağusa on these.  It is organisations like ours that will pave the way for a better future for our people.

Written by Erman Berkay, AEGEE-Mağusa

Get excited! From now on it might become easier for you to travel to a corner of Europe located between the Mediterranean Sea and the Middle East… In case you stay in the good graces of the local members in Hatay, Turkey. But that should not be a problem!

Hatay was approved as a new AEGEE Contact during the previous Spring Agora in Enschede.

It certainly has great potential for the network. Located on the border to Syria, Hatay is characterized by a Mediterranean climate, and offers a lot of historical sights to tourists and visitors,  among which an important archaeological museum and Saint Pierre Church, said to be the first Catholic church in the world. “We will invite students from abroad”, promises Onur Ölmez, the leader of the new Contact, who studies Public Administration at the local university in Antakya.

A new Contact? Not exactly. There was an antenna in Hatay before, until the board stopped working. Now, six young people prove the will to start a new one from the very beginning. They paid the remaining debts of the former board at the Agora and already selected candidates for future new board which now is organising the activities until the start of the new term. Community seems a key concept when Ölmez speaks about his colleagues as his “team”, and motivation is high. “Our basic plan is a Summer University of course!”, the leader of Contact points out.

As Summer University is unique for antenna, they can not yet put this plan into effect, but Ölmez and his team successfully planned local trainings on the topics of volunteering and project management at their university. Each of them is bringing Hatay one step closer to their goal of re-establishing the antenna AEGEE-Hatay. The next phase will be proceeding to a Contact Antenna status, for which the rules of AEGEE require a list of at least ten members.

The foundations have been laid: in consequence of the workshops held, AEGEE is getting more popular at the Mustafa Kemal University in Antakya. With their enthusiasm, the team will certainly attract more supporters soon.

Written by Birte Huntemann, AEGEE-Mannheim