On June 18th, the European Facility Management Network (EuroFM) organized its first edition of the Student Festival as part of the EuroFM ‘Stay Connected’ sessions. Instead of meeting the students in real life during our annual EFMIC conference (originally planned for Barcelona this year), we organized a virtual festival to celebrate our youngest FM professionals
The Student Festival is part of a series of three sessions and featured the 2020 EuroFM Student Competition. Eight bright students from universities of applied sciences in Germany, Spain, the Netherlands, and Turkey presented a 3-minute video of their vision on the current FM field and market. Based on their internship, thesis, or a school project. Around 55 attendees witnessed the students pitch their videos in a clear and enthusiastic way. The variety of topics covered the workplace environment, the role of FM in educational surroundings, EuroFM Ambassadors, and how to connect them, FM and technology, outsourcing, and the challenges for FM on airports. Check them out on our new EuroFM YouTube channel!
The quality of the videos was high, and it made it difficult for the jury to decide on the 3 best presentations. The jury assessed the videos on their content, creativity and added value for FM and decided on the 3 following finalists:Robin Ganninger and his group from Münster University of Applied Sciences,Sakithya Shanmugaratnam and her group from DHBW Stuttgart and Esmeé Bechthold from Breda University of Applied Sciences. These 3 presentations will be part of our next ‘Stay Connected’ session on June 25th where we will ask the audience to vote for the winner of the 2020 EuroFM Student Competition.
The Student Festival started with a great presentation by Rodney Dass, a young FM professional at IFS Dublin, Ireland. He explained why the FM field should include young FM professionals into their business by stipulating their advantages as Generation Z. The program also included speed date sessions with EuroFM Ambassadors from Egypt, Turkey, South Africa, The Netherlands, Bulgaria, and Russia, as well as the FM Student Pub Quiz. Overall, it was an inspiring and fun event, where we indeed celebrated the input of our youngest members!
