Trips, parties and several social events. That is what’s on the agenda for the Erasmus Student Network Lund this autumn.
Photo: Jens Hansen.
The trips are the most well known activity from Erasmus Student Network Lund, and we can expect to see more trips happening compared to last semester. Also, the organization is developing a new mobile App to get in tune with the hi-tech life of students today.
Run entirely on a voluntary basis by students, for students, ESN Lund has the right perspective to create activities that meet students’ needs. Their goal in each event is to create a venue for students to meet new people with multinational backgrounds and experience an enjoyable experience of the local setting.
“One of the best things is that you never see anyone alone on a trip. You make a lot of friends that you end up hanging out with even after the trip is over”, says Emina Salic, the president of the organization.
A Smorgasbord
Social events such as café meet-ups, Smorgasbord, and parties are good to fill your free time for one afternoon/evening; on the other hand, trips may be more suitable to fill your weekend plans. The SEA Battle and the Lapland Trips are among the most popular.
Emina Salic speaks from her own experience,
“I went to the SEA Battle last semester and it’s what made me fall in love with ESN. On this trip everyone is super friendly and in this ‘let’s do something fun together’ mood.”
More members
This semester ESN has worked a lot with recruiting more members. They prepared booths in the student fairs, kept activity up on the Facebook page ESN LUND, and infiltrated the new international student society by posting active members as group leaders in the International Mentor program of introduction week. These strategies have paid off and they have gained more than 600 members in the first three weeks of school, which is more members than the entire last semester. And the numbers keep rising.
“We have also had to set up multiple trips. For example we only planned one Helsingborg/Helsingor Trip, but it was in such demand that we are planning another trip to accommodate everyone”, she says.
As an organization, ESN still has a few things to improve on. Emina Salic shared with us one of the biggest challenges they are still working on,
“The biggest homework is to get more Swedish people to join. Partly because of the name, the organization is thought to be internationally oriented. We want to interest the Swedish people because it is supposed to be a melting pot of different cultures where people can also meet locals and understand the culture from a local perspective.”
ESN Lund office is located in AF building, 4th floor. Office hours for registration are Monday 16.00-18.00 and Thursdays, 11.00-13.00.
About the Erasmus Students Netork Lund
The Erasmus Student Network Lund, or ESN Lund, organizes trips and social events for students. It is the social initiative from the main student exchange program in Europe, the Erasmus Program, however their activities are open to all students at Lund University, Swedish and International alike.
Trips are planned with the student budget in mind and are pretty cheap. To get access to this cheap fare, one needs to register to become an ESN member for a fee of 50SEK, which helps ESN pay for its administrative needs such as office rent in the AF building.
