{"id":117601,"date":"2020-09-10T17:42:30","date_gmt":"2020-09-10T15:42:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/?p=117601"},"modified":"2025-12-19T11:25:03","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T10:25:03","slug":"looking-back-at-eurekaweek-2020-everything-we-fought-for-has-been-rounded-off-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/2020\/09\/10\/looking-back-at-eurekaweek-2020-everything-we-fought-for-has-been-rounded-off-now\/","title":{"rendered":"Looking back at Eurekaweek 2020: ‘Everything we fought for has been rounded off now’"},"content":{"rendered":"

This year\u2019s Eurekaweek was like nothing before. At one point it seemed very likely that the orientation week would be called off altogether. And then, at the eleventh hour, it got the green light. Year after year, Eurekaweek boards have been able to build on the preceding editions. But the nine students who took on this year\u2019s task had to face challenge after challenge. We meet with board chair Sander Doude van Troostwijk, to look back on four key moments in the run-up to this year\u2019s Eurekaweek.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Eurekaweek 2020 – Chairman Sander Doude van Troostwijk <\/span><\/p>

\n\t\n\n<\/svg>\n<\/span>\n\tImage by:<\/span>\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tEurekaweek 2020<\/span>\t\t\t\t\t<\/span>\n\t<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>

\u201cWe keep saying to each other in the board that we\u2019ve basically organised three Eurekaweeks\u201d, says Sander Doude van Troostwijk, chairman of the 2020 Eurekaweek board. \u201cThe regular programme for Eurekaweek is great, and we had identified some opportunities to fine-tune it. For example, Monday afternoon and Wednesday evening both focus on introducing the students to the city. We wanted to do more with the digital options offered by our app. These ideas and plans had more or less been rounded off by early March. After this, we planned to flesh them out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thursday 12 March, 7 p.m.<\/h2>

On 12 March, the Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte calls together a press conference to announce new measures for curbing the spread of the Covid-19 virus. \u201cIt turned out to be a bit more serious than we had assumed, so you start discussing your options. I remember saying, \u2018Let\u2019s prepare ourselves for what might happen so we won\u2019t be taken unawares.\u2019\u201d The board started thinking about what else was possible. What could actually be done online? Could smaller groups be an option? \u201cWhen you start on something like this, you commit to organising an event for 5,000 people. But would that still be feasible? From that point on, we started to work on multiple scenarios, side by side.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\t

\n\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t
\n\t\t\u2018Anything seemed possible. I didn\u2019t have those small dips yet, where you thought: Oh shit, this changes everything!\u2019\n\t<\/blockquote>\n\n\t<\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n

The Eurekaweek board was allowed to return to campus fairly soon after the start of the lockdown \u2013 to the considerable relief of its chair. \u201cStaff members were allowed to work in the Polak Building, and the Eurekaweek board also counts as staff. I remember that some people had it \u2013 and still have it \u2013 a lot worse than we did. So we were very grateful and happy that we could get together again for brainstorming. Have you ever tried to brainstorm via Zoom or Teams? It\u2019s sluggish, but we had to make new plans.\u201d<\/p>\n

There were other perks to having an office on campus besides more effective brainstorming. You also sign up for a year on the board to make new friends, according to Doude van Troostwijk. And being stuck at home didn\u2019t help. \u201cYou got out of bed, had breakfast, went over to your desk and flipped your laptop open. And when you closed it at the end of the day, that was the last you\u2019d see of each other for the time being. We were colleagues, that\u2019s it. We must have played every game available on Zoom, but I\u2019m really more into seeing people in person.\u201d<\/p>\n

The board members\u2019 own experiences with digital interaction \u2013 and how difficult it is to really bond this way \u2013 also informed their basic point of departure for Eurekaweek 2020: organise as many opportunities for offline encounters for the new students as possible under the circumstances. In mid-March, their focus lies elsewhere though. \u201cIn this period, we worked\u00a0with a number of different scenarios. Anything seemed possible. In early April, I didn\u2019t have those small dips yet, where you thought: \u2018Oh shit, this changes everything!\u2019 I remember one moment like it was yesterday, though: 21 April, a Tuesday, 7 p.m.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tuesday 21 April, 7 p.m.<\/h2>

\u201cWe were still at the office. The closer we got to Eurekaweek, the longer our work days had become. Of course, we knew that there would be another press conference about the Covid measures that evening, so we sat down to watch it together.\u201d That evening, the government announced that it would be extending the ban on events that required a permit until 1 September \u2013 a week after Eurekaweek 2020, in other words. In a few seconds, many of the plans that the board had been working on for months could be thrown in the bin.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn a situation like that, you don\u2019t want to make any hasty decisions, but you can\u2019t afford to do nothing. Although you do wonder: is this or that option necessary, overkill or wrong altogether? You need to get cracking \u2013 otherwise it may be too little, too late. What complicated things was that no one knows what the future will bring. At least, I don\u2019t think so\u201d, he adds with a smile.<\/p>\n\n\t

\n\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t
\n\t\t\u2018You do wonder: is this or that option necessary, overkill or wrong altogether?\u2019\n\t<\/blockquote>\n\n\t<\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n

In early May, Doude van Troostwijk watches back some clips of Eurekaweek 2019. It affects him more than he had expected. All those people having fun, the atmosphere \u2013 that\u2019s what he was hoping to create too. \u201cWhen do you get the opportunity to organise an event for 5,000 people? Me personally, probably never again.\u201d It still isn\u2019t clear whether Eurekaweek will be going ahead. But the board can now set to work on a new plan: a second version of the orientation week. \u201cI said to the other eight board members: \u2018This isn\u2019t what you signed up for \u2013 including the extra pressure and stress. Feel free to bow out if you want to.\u2019 They looked at me as if I had gone mad. I can\u2019t express how proud I am of everyone. We\u2019ve really done it as a team.\u201d<\/p>\n

Eurekaweek as we all know it won\u2019t be going ahead. So where to from now? \u201cWe work with three pillars: becoming better acquainted with each other, the city and the university. That has always been our point of reference. Bringing thousands of first-year students together in one spot was out of the question. Our plan was to arrange 160 separate locations across the city that groups could visit one after the other.\u201d It promised to be the most physical freshers\u2019 week in the Netherlands, and Rector Magnificus Rutger Engels was highly supportive of this plan, remembers Doude van Troostwijk. \u201cThe university\u2019s support was very important to us \u2013 as shown by both Rutger and Joop (Matthijsse, head of Student Affairs). We had only been part of staff for a few months at that point, and were still given that much confidence. They said: \u2018Develop a plan for us. We\u2019ll be happy to think along.\u2019 That\u2019s exactly what we needed to hear for a plan as ambitious as that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wednesday 5 August, the push message of 9:19 p.m.<\/h2>

The board were sitting around a big table, having a few drinks. They had just finished testing Identity Crisis<\/a>, an interactive game on your tablet in which you followed different instructions that had been devised especially for Eurekaweek. \u201cThen the RTL Nieuws<\/a> push message came in. I don\u2019t remember who saw it first, but what he or she said doesn\u2019t bear repeating. It came down to: \u2018Well, this is a bit of a disappointment.\u2019 And that\u2019s putting it very politely.\u201d RTL\u2019s headline? \u2018Cabinet wants to scrap student orientation weeks.\u2019 Back to square one again.<\/p>\n\n\t

\n\t\t\n\t\t
\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

<\/h2>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t