Incredible things always happen during an Agora. The AEGEEan checked old material and asked some old members for interesting stories about this issue, a funny way to approach the upcoming Spring Agora Bergamo and read some legends of the past. 

The Agora can be something legendary for those who have never been there, since they probably heard many stories before departure. For those who already experienced it at least once, it is something incredible: a thousand of people from all over Europe, a huge common commitment, great discussions, fabulous encounters, moments of sharing and great parties. For the people organising it, it is something very different. More than one year ago, I had the honour of being an organiser of Autumn Agora Cagliari. If you ask me to say what it looks like, I would probably say tiring, challenging and agitating. If you ask me why, the answer is easy: anything can happen, even if you planned it in detail.

For every organiser there is always a precise moment when s/he realises that the event started, in my case was the following episode:

On the 28^th of October 2014, a sponsor gave us two cars and a big van. They were quite big and none of us had used a van before. We drove them to pick up CD members at the airport and, after greeting them, we put the luggage inside the last one. Once ready to drive it, an alarm rang showing that the trunk was open, we closed it many times without any result and then we thought it was a van problem. Of course the reality was very different, because as soon as we had entered the highway we heard dozens of horns around us: two bags of our former president Paul Smits broke out in the street forcing uncountable cars to make extraordinary riggings and we had to walk in the middle of the street to take them back.

Anything can happen

After that moment, many stories I heard about disasters during previous Agorae came to my mind. Maybe you do not know but a lot of weird things happened during our statutory events in the past. Not all the things regarded only organisers or were bad, some of there were actually very positive. But of course at that moment I started thinking about the worst possible scenarios.

To start: one of the things to know about the Agora is that it didn’t always look like it does today, at the first ones there were not that many participants. During Agora Salerno 1989, about two or three hundred participants were present and local organisers picked them up at the train station by car! It was the very same Agora during which the Berlin wall fell down and a participant said: “We did not know about the fall of the Wall. There were no mobiles, no one saw the news. I read about it on Monday after the Agora”.

In 1994, Agora Montpellier started at a plenary hall but finished on the market square of the French city. Why? According to our source “the freshly re-elected President of AEGEE-Europe, Dorian Selz, did not accept the election result, because he got only 52% of the votes. Before a new candidate could be voted, all the members of the Agora had to leave the building since it was closing time. So they gathered in front of the building and elected the successor, Christina Thorsson, there”. Still, it was not the worst result ever for a presidential candidate. In 1998 Stefan Seidel from AEGEE-Augsburg was elected with a poor 38%. At first he did not want to accept it and said: “I will go home now”. But people convinced him to stay in office. A bad mistake since at the next Agora his CD got a vote of confidence and lost it.

The first day of the Agora in Athina in November 2002 was overshadowed by a blackout. Suddenly the plenary hall went dark. In this case, the reaction was amazing since organisers lightened a couple of hundreds of small candles and gave the Juridical Commission president, Yuriy Tokarsky, a flashlight which he held on the Agora booklet so that President Tomak Helbin could present the CD report. It was accepted with an overwhelming majority. The organisers of autumn Agora Zaragoza in 2003 had bad luck. They could not get the promised location and had to move the Agora to an old fair instead. The participants were sleeping inside that giant hall, when one of them turned on a switch, which he mistook for a light switch.

It was the switch for the ventilation and a dead bird, which had ended its life near the ventilator, fell down – right on the sleeping bag of a Dutch participant. The history had a revival in the last years when AEGEE-Zaragoza was chosen as host of the Autumn Agora 2013, some people in fact wondered if participants were going to stay in the same place again: it was not, the event was hosted in a brand new structure used for Expo Zaragoza 2008 and the organisation was simply amazing!

An incredible year: 2006!

If there is a year champion for incredible statutory events, that’s definitely 2006, since in both the Agorae which took place an incredible fact occured. At Agora Warsawa 2006, about twenty couples which found a lonely corner in a garage to spend some nice time with the respective partner: they got registered by a surveillance camera and watched live stream by the guards.

As this history can be familiar to the readers, not so known is the case of Agora Napoli 2006: in the late afternoon of the 1st of November the water boiler plant of the Fair broke down. It was the All Saint’s day, national holiday in Italy, and the same is the 2^nd of November (All Souls’ day). Organisers desperately tried to find a plumber but it resulted in an impossible mission! One of them said: “The only solution to find a plumber in Napoli on the 2^nd of November is to look for him at a cemetery”. The situation was not fixed and participants started a huge protest because of cold water in the showers.

Recent years

Lately there have not been such big cases if we exclude huge delays in the agenda, a vote of confidence, some locals which left the plenary for protest, a broken motorbike in Agora Patra 2014 or participants who had to move their luggage because of handball match (they were already informed about it). These can be considered as funny or sad thing things which happened. Except for two cases.

Most of us probably remember the 2010 eruptions of Eyjafjallajökull volcano in Iceland, which stopped the flight traffic from the 14^th till 23^rd of April of the same year. I guess you can imagine what happened: Agora Leiden was taking place from the 15^th till 18^th of the very same month: the perfect moment to destroy the travel plans of hundreds of AEGEEans, especially for their route back home, and create difficulties for organisers who had to take care of them.

If we also consider the CD members as organisers, since AEGEE-Europe is a partner organiser of the Agora, we cannot forget Agora Struga 2011 organised by AEGEE-Skopje. Because of an argue between the CD and local organisers, who increased the event fee one month before the event, for the last days of the event, the organisers disappeared leaving the CD and some other improvised helper managing the whole organisation – starting from the wake up till the welcome pack preparations!

The good God of AEGEE resides in Athina

It is possible that some organisers of Agora Bergamo or Autumn Agora Chisinau are getting scared while reading this article. In that case we should also remind them that AEGEE has a good God ready to solve every situation…and probably he is a member of AEGEE-Athina. Somehow the Greek local managed to solve not just a difficult situation but even two!

In the far 1992, this local organised an Agora which not took place in Athens but in Kōs, a Dodecanese island in front of the Turkish coast. You may wonder why they wanted to host the event there and the answer is quite easy: Agora was taking place in Spring, in Greece the weather is always nice so let’s gather all the participants in Athens to make a nice boat trip all together! While the organisation was running perfectly, only four days before the event an organiser switched on the TV and saw the sailor’s Labour Union president declaring started an unlimited duration strike because of high taxes. A panic attack caught the Greek organisers which started thinking about all the participants meandering around the Pireaus port and possible solutions to avoid it. One of them, was to meet the same president of the Union Labour – which they did but without results. The second solution, which now can sound very funny but probably in those moments was not, was to get an appointment with the Minister for Foreign Affairs and ask him to talk with the minister for the Defence to get a military vessel and transport all the participants to Kōs. Through some contact they succeeded to get the appointment.

At 11 am, two days before the Agora. The minister is taking part in a high level meeting with the Greek PM and the president of the Republic. Organisers are in front of the office ready to meet him, but at 11.05 they see everyone leaving the building and packing their things. They wonder why and they ask one of the officials “Is he coming?” – “No he is not coming at all, he just resigned 5 minutes ago because of disagreements on foreign policies”.

In case you wonder how participants reached the location, the story says that the greek minister of Finances (of course pure coincidence) accepted the requests of the labour union the day right before the boat departure. That’s how Agora Kōs could take place.

In case you do not believe to this story, you can download the 10th AEGEE anniversary booklet and read about it there (p. 92).

To end

Dear future Agora organisers, as you could see, also in the darkest situations there is always light and space for hope, and the people of AEGEE-Athina can confirm it for sure!

It has not been an isolated case since we also heard that while spring Agora in Barcelona 1999 was taking place overshadowed by the Nato air strikes against Serbia (with lots of people arriving late, because of many flights cancelled or rerouted), among the participants was Jasna Bogdanovic, President of AEGEE-Novi Sad. She took the opportunity to leave the country and was hosted by the President of AEGEE-Barcelona. They fell in love and got married.

So we wish you good luck and may the good God of AEGEE be with you!

Written by Mattia Abis, AEGEE-Cagliari

It was once said that the best way to spend your money would by travelling: for the insight, wisdom, joy and friendships you would get, experience and make is said to be priceless. While many people agree that travelling broadens the mind, it also narrows it in a certain way. For when you travel, you tend not to have enough time to really get to know the people you are travelling with. It is from these people, migrants, travellers, traders and other transients that we get stereotypes. Nowadays, there exist a great deal of these; the Germans are aggressive, the French are hedonistic cowards and the English have an obsession for tea like Gollum has one for “the one Ring to rule them all”. However, let us not be offensive and look at some long forgotten, historical stereotypes. Reader’s discretion, however, is still advised.

The Swedes will take you at night

It seems weird to think of Swedish people as bad guys; they are currently amongst the top seven of most peaceful countries in the world, according to the Global Peace Index. However, at a certain point in history, there was nothing that would make entire German cities more frightened than the rumour that a Swedish army was marching towards them. During the Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648) almost all European countries were at war with each other for opportunism, freedom and religion, in a manner that could be said to be even more complicated and violent than the current conflict in Iraq and Syria. While there was conflict in Austria, Bohemia and the Low Countries, the bulk of the fighting and the senseless violence happened in the Holy Roman Empire, also known as Germany, where as much as two thirds of the population was exterminated.

One of the most senseless of these slaughters was the sack of Magdeburg (1630-1631), when the Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus let this German city he was allied with know that he and his army were on their way to relieve them from the Imperial troops that were about to assault the city. Instead, he marched south to attack the Bavarian city of Ingolstadt. The city of Magdeburg was eventually taken and burned to the ground. No less than eighty-five percent of its population was killed during the firestorm. For its military ravages in Bavaria and for letting the total destruction of Magdeburg happen, the Swedish were often depicted as the bad guys in children’s stories and songs. Until the 1980s German children were put to bed with the warning that, if they would not go to sleep, the Swedish would come and take them.

 The Portuguese have syphilis

Syphilis is one of those diseases you give to the ones you love, or at least to the ones you make love to. However, regardless of the pleasure it may have given those who have spread the disease, having syphilis remains a pretty nasty condition. The disease itself is only sexually transmitted and has originated from the Americas until it was spread to Europe by Spanish conquistadors, who may have had less than consensual sex with the natives of the New World. From that moment on, the disease spread amongst soldiers and sailors (the same people who created stereotypes), prostitutes, and then bachelors or even married men, until finally it was spread amongst people from all walks of life: even kings and queens. That is not to say that everybody had syphilis, but it was common enough for people to know what it was, where it came from and which kind of people were most likely to carry the disease with them.

Instead of blaming the disease on their soldiers or adulterous partners, when the only treatment was ingesting poisonous mercury, however, the people of Europe thought it better to do something else. Countries back then began to blame countries they disliked for causing and spreading the disease. The Dutch, then at war with Spain and Portugal, called it the Portuguese disease, the French called it the English disease and the English and Germans called it the French disease. The then German city of Strasbourg had even called the part of the city, where the syphilis patients were treated, the ‘French quarter’.

Jews will steal your babies

 Written by Willem Laurentzen, AEGEE-Nijmegen

Pick a topic; any topic, occupation, skill or subject and you will find a multitude of how-to guides in stores or online. Grossing over 1800 guides the For Dummies guides might be the very first of these to come to mind. However, until recently there wasn’t a guide yet that could tell you how to deal with the various aspects any member of AEGEE might encounter during his or her membership.

Go online, then go to the Members Portal and you will find a collection of eight, of which three still upcoming, how-to manuals, which are called toolkits. As the name suggests, these toolkits could prove to be very convenient whenever in a stressful situation. After all, a helpful tool could already do half the work for anyone. 

Back to our past

The first of the five already published toolkits is on the most fundamental of mankind’s philosophical questions and rightwing parties’ most vocally expressed standpoint: Identity. Much like the Bohemian artists in Baz Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge the identity of AEGEE and its members could be summed up in four pillars; vision, mission, means and statement of principles. While they might not seem as interesting to a reader as the exclamations of ‘beauty’, ‘truth’, ‘freedom’ and ‘love’, these four pillars do contain a bit of those four bohemian ones in them. Vision is to strive for a democratic, diverse, borderless and integrated Europe, in which there is an esteemed place for young people’s participation. It is in short, an aspiration of the generally youthful members of AEGEE for all to be able to enjoy and shape the different cultural flavours, which are in such a rich abundance on the European continent.

How to achieve this mission? Every European themed activity attended by every member of AEGEE had in fact paved the way for this vision. The international themes of these activities were not merely a decoration, but to either a greater or lesser extend something that made members more aware of the interconnections of the various cultures and likeminded communities throughout Europe. This in its proper terms gets summed up in the statement of principles, using keywords to describe the vision, mission and means: diversity, cooperation, freedom, a strong Europe and progress.

As any child is formed by his or her upbringing from an early age onward, a community is also defined by its history. Generally a student association’s history goes as far back as its longest existing member, except for AEGEE. Using the History Toolkit any member can dig up some fun facts about their association using the smart timeline. AEGEE for instance is not very old, however, it does exist longer than the age of most of its individual members. It has been established even before the fall of the Berlin Wall, in the middle of the nineteen eighties at the height of the Reganite anti-communist offense during the Cold War.

In 1985 EGEE, as it was called then, was founded in Paris by representatives from six cities from each a different country. Although it was inspired by an earlier 1950’s student protest for a more integrated Europe in Strasbourg, the name was based on neither its foundation nor its inspiration. The name EGEE (États Généraux des Étudiants de l’Europe) is in fact an onomatopoeia of the Aegean, a sea whose costal shores are one of the contenders for the oldest democratic political system on earth. More specifically the Greek colony of Patras on the north-western most part of the Peloponnesos. Furthermore, the choice of referring to itself as an ‘États Généraux’ or an Estates General is a conscious one. In many European countries the Estates General or the ‘Commons’ is a political body where representatives who are not of nobility or clergy can take a seat in. Like the Estates General, AEGEE consists of common members representing the general population of their respective country or antenna or to put it differently, direct democratic representation: no elitism. To cut a long story short, next time someone says he or she is a member of AEGEE they are referring to an organisation, which values both proponents of classical and modern democracy.

Fundraising, Public Relations and Human Resources Cycle

Fundraising manual is a helpful tool, which shows that fundraising can occur in a number of ways. From public to private funding of either money or goods, it shows that fundraising thrives on a mutual gain. How do you get these mutually beneficial donations? Check out the toolkit. So next time, when an antenna organizes a barbecue, there might be a chance that the meat is free and fresh, funded from the local butcher.

When members go on a Summer University they might have noticed that in their home country AEGEE is viewed as an association, whereas abroad it is a forum or a union. As languages differ, so do the concepts their words try to articulate. So, when something is called an ‘association’ in French the word ‘forum’ might cover the concept of AEGEE best in English. Spanning thirty-five languages, there is a name for AEGEE in each and every one of them. For more interesting notes on how to promote an antenna, check out the Public Relations toolkit.

Finally there is the Human Resources Cycle, which could be seen as the Book of the Living combined with the Book of the Dead, but AEGEE style. From a member’s introduction to their entry into alumni-hood, there is one manual to help them all the way. This guide could be seen as the mother of all toolkits, since it combines bits of all the other published toolkits. It has parts of the four pillars of AEGEE, to which each member is subtlety introduced to from their introduction onwards. It shows how to promote AEGEE and deals a bit with AEGEE’s history and its fundraising. However, above all it gives aspiring mentors some convenient tips on how to excel at an introduction. Being a mentor or parent is never easy and sometimes people might wish there was a guide. However, as an aspiring mentor of an introduction, how could you resist a toolkit that refers to you as “angels”?

Written by Willem Laurentzen, AEGEE-Nijmegen

It all started from an on-line debate, and now it is about to become an AEGEE-Europe project. Last December, the Culture Working Group (CWG) set up a Skype debate about History textbooks and how they are influenced by nationalisms in Europe. EurStory is a newborn in AEGEE, but it’s ready to rock the Network and to make ‘History’!

We cannot deny that nationalism in textbooks leads to lots of contradictions on the ways the subject is taught in many countries. Kristóf Papp, president of AEGEE-Budapest, saw a brilliant opportunity in the past debate held by the Culture Working Group about Textbooks & Nationalism and decided to take the lead on making a project about European History textbooks come true. This is how EurStory was born.

EurStory team members Luca Gallyas and Kristóf Papp (AEGEE-Budapest) in the Agora Fair in Rhein-Neckar

“I felt this project was perfectly describing me”. Kristóf grew up in a small city close to the Croatian border, which has a great Ottoman influence. Besides, during several AEGEE events, “I met the different aspects of the interpretation of History in the Central-European region”. All these facts, combined with his passion for History, pushed him to take up the challenge of leading such an ambitious project.

But what is exactly EurStory about? “We want to show Europe that there is a History we are all part of, and that we all have different points of view”, Kristóf explains. There is still a big amount of sensitive topics in European history. EurStory aims to observe and gather the different points of view on relevant historical facts from high school textbooks, and to highlight both their similarities and differences.

The Project Team of EurStory gathered for the first time last May in Brussels, and agreed in their objectives and outline for the project. According to Kristóf, “in order to present all the information, we want to publish comparisons and debates, interesting facts reachable for students as an additional source, and a website with a timeline”. The second part of the project aims to lobby for changes in school textbooks, and to “free them of nationalistic approach”.

The project is still in the planning and recruitment part, but there are some other challenging goals ahead: “we are planning to have a Training Course where we can teach people how to represent the different aspects of History”, Kristóf says. And then comes the cherry to the cake: the Project Team of EurStory plans to visit high schools and give workshops all over Europe, in a similar way like the YOUrope needs YOU! project did in its time.

Positive feedback from the Network and externals

EurStory’s logo, by Benjamin Doll (AEGEE-Mainz-Wiesbaden)

Even though EurStory has just started walking, it has already found a strong support throughout the Network. So far, it has supporters and team members from almost every region in Europe, thanks to its presence in several European events such as the Spring Agora Rhein-Neckar or some Summer Universities. Kristóf admits that the whole project has been changing since the beginning, because of the feedbacks received: “I think I can say that people is excited about the project and everybody has been trying to help us with their opinions and comments”.

Marta Astorgano, member of AEGEE-Barcelona and History student, led a workshop in the TSU between AEGEE-Barcelona and AEGEE-Las Palmas. Looking back at the workshop, she is happy with the outcomes it gave: “we had a couple of members who were really touched by our goals, got in touch with us and asked to be a part of the project”. However, she admits that it’s hard to make most of the members keep its interest in History. “I understand that it’s a heavy subject and it needs concentration, so in a workshop at a Summer University is normal that people lose their attention quite easily”, she says.

Furthermore, EurStory counts with a strong supporter who might be quite well-known for many AEGEEans. It’s Dr. James Skelly, who has taken part in some panel discussions in AEGEE’s Statutory Events. Kristóf Papp approached him in the EBM Valletta, and was offered lots of materials and support from the beginning: “he [Skelly] said it has a huge potential. Since the EBM I met him several times, and we were discussing about the possible working method. He suggested to make the comparisons between exact events, which became the fundamental base of the project”.

A great idea that expects great outcomes

“We have lots of hours of reading, writing and contrasting ahead us, but I hope the outcome is great, because the idea is”, Marta says. There are many ways you can get more information and get involved in the project: the EurStory project team members plan to give a workshop in Autumn Agora Zaragoza, and you will hopefully see them on stage, too!

You can also reach them through:

– Facebook group

– Contact mail

Let’s all make history in AEGEE!

Written by Anna Gumbau, AEGEE-Barcelona

Pictures by Dasha Onokhova, AEGEE-Moskva

Original Article

1995 was the year of our Association’s tenth anniversary which we took as an opportunity to analyse the achievements of AEGEE in its first ten years.

AEGEE has realised a number of its aims, the biggest one being the creation of a truly pan-European network spreading all over the continent and using it to promote the European idea among young people, especially within the student population.

In the last ten years, AEGEE gave over 200,000 people the opportunity to increase their awareness of Europe first hand, during projects and events organized on topics of young people’s concern.

Many results and experiences were taken from different projects and events, and they were presented to the responsible institutions and the outside world. The greatest result however, the experience of all of us, that we can only build the society of tomorrow together, cannot be measured. With the world moving closer and closer together, with distances becoming shorter and communication faster and more plentiful every day, there is no alternative to mutual understanding and co-operation in order to tackle and solve the problems of the future.

Also in 1996, AEGEE has great plans to integrate more people into an all-European society.

This year we will see major milestones – in the content and structure of our Association. With our office moving to Brussels we decided to be closer to many organisations that will determine the fate of Europe more than ever. With the project “Find your way to and within an open society” we see a co-operation of 14 locals in East and West, working together to strengthen the pluralistic society in Central and Eastern Europe.

Over 100 European events with topics ranging from Education to the European Monetary Union are going to be organized by AEGEE antennae. Many of these events are to be seen in an international context of co-operation of different antennae in certain fields which we chose to focus on, such as the issues at stake in the upcoming Intergovernmental Conference, the question about our common European identity, and the challenges and opportunities of the Information Society.

15,000 students in 170 cities from Amsterdam to Athina and from Madrid to Moskva are presently members of our Association and the numbers are still growing. But growth is not an objective in itself; it is a way to improve the European society of tomorrow by involving more and more young people in learning from and about each other and thus enabling them to live together in peace and prosperity.

Written by Christoph Strohm, AEGEE-Köln and President of AEGEE-Europe in 1995

Originally published in Key To Europe 1995-1996

A couple of weeks ago we started an online survey with the question whether the Summer University Project needs a new logo. For some of you may be out of the blue, but an idea that has been around for some time now.

From the responses we got through our survey or on Facebook people were very much divided on this, and not just divided but also with strong opinions and emotionally expressed. Not strange if you know that the Summer Universities can be life changing and people have great memories and thoughts about them. All triggered by a small smiling sun with a graduation cap on.

Before explaining ourselves first the results. 93 Votes were casted. Out of these votes 51 were in favour of changing the logo (55%). A little less, 42 votes were against changing the logo (45%).

So why did we come up with the idea to have a survey on the logo of the Summer University. As commented wisely by some of you the logo is actually the least to worry about for the SUCT and there are many more important things we have to do. Agreed. But since we like to take on more work and get the Summer University even better we also wanted to address the visual identity and thus the logo of the project. So why? Is the current logo not good enough?

The logo of the Summer University Project since 1997 (or earlier?), 2006, 2010

Since many years the Summer University project has had the sun in one or another way as its logo. Nothing wrong with that, it is funny, takes away the seriousness the projects name creates, and looking at the number of applicants every year it does not seem to be a problem. No problem, so no need to change it you could say. But since our network is slowly changing due to the changing environment AEGEE has to manoeuvre in, there are calls to address issues that do not cause any problems yet. This is also one of the reasons to avoid the dialectics of lead.
This makes me to come to two issues that we need to address. One in general for AEGEE, the second one more specific for the Summer University project:

1. In the upcoming years there is a big chance that AEGEE will see a greatly reduced income from public funds. So new ways have to be found to gain income to keep providing our network with the facilities and services we have built in the last years.

2. New technologies give people not only new ways of communicating, but also cheaper and easier traveling. Compared to 25 years ago, we have many different ways to go abroad. Relatively cheap. AEGEE and the Summer University project are not the only way for us, the youth, to discover the world. So why would we first join AEGEE, go through all the selection process and maybe, or maybe not, end up with a Summer University while you can travel yourself cheap and easy throughout the continent and even further?

These two points are issues we don’t have any traction on. We can’t just ignore them and go ahead the way we have done for the last many years. Since both of them are quite big issues I’ll address the first one in this article, especially because this one was the reason to start with the survey. A later article will discuss the second topic.

Reduced public funds for AEGEE

During last Agora more attention has already been addressed to this subject by the Comité Directeur. Because the question is whether we can still pay for the work of the Comité Directeur in the future, will the house still be paid for by the Commission, what about support for projects or training courses and of course the travel reimbursements to keep in touch with the network. This makes the Comité Directeur look for new ways of raising money, and not only should they do so, but the entire network. Actively or passively by providing ways for private or commercial funding.
As some of you wrote in the responses of the survey, and we only agree on, the Summer University project is maybe the “real flagship” project of AEGEE. It has every year the largest and most widespread attention throughout the European continent. So why not use that properly? So should we not use the Summer University project to raise money for our beloved association, for our great network?

Market research on logos of youth summer schools, universities and local summer camps

As Summer University Coordination team we think we should. But how can we do that? For a start we can sell advertisement space in the booklet, on posters and on our website. To convince possible companies, organisations or other partners to buy that space we do need to look a little professional. Well, one of the many other responses in the survey was that the logo should look more professional and more appealing. That is exactly what we agree on. The current sun is not a logo that would convince potential partners to support this project and therefore AEGEE. The question is whether they would take it serious at all? It is more of a quickly designed logo by a small local organisation trying to organise a summer school or summer camp (see image). And doesn’t the sun maybe portray the image of the Summer University project we don’t want it to have to the external world: sun, sea, party, sex and drugs. Unfortunately, these were actual responses in the survey to the question what associations you have with the Summer University project.

Market research on logos of travel agencies and organisations

If we want to achieve the goal of making the Summer University project look more professional and act by its image as a trustworthy partner for other organisations, it is nice to look at organisations that have the same intention. For example, if we have a look at other travel organisations or organisations (see the image), then there is no smiley or personalised faces to be found in their logos. Why? Because they quickly look childish and not capable to act as a big and important partner. Not for cooperations, not for potential customers. However, to portray they are about traveling there are some other things that do come back often: the shape of the sun, bright various colours, icons of faraway destinations, or icons what they serve you: flights, biking tours, hikes, etc.

If you look at our lovely Sun logo, would you as potential partner cooperate with AEGEE to promote your service and pay lots of money for that? I would not.
So let us prepare for new times, and move forward. What are your ideas for a new logo?

Written by Maurits Korse, AEGEE-Enschede & SUCT