EPM Barcelona 2020: A New Start for an Unstoppable Growth

Written by Asier Rodríguez Member of the EPM Barcelona 2020 Core Team

The EPM Barcelona 2020: “No One Left Behind” took place from 5th to 9th February 2020 at the campus of the Autonomous University of Barcelona in the metropolitan area of Barcelona. The topic of the conference was social inclusion, including one and a half days of debates and meetings about the topic. After that, the drafting of the Strategic Plan was carried out for the four new Focus Areas selected on previous Autumn Agora Salerno 2019. There were more than 160 participants coming from all over Europe hosted in the facilities of the university and an organising team composed of approximately 25 AEGEEans willing to give their best to make it the best event ever.

The idea for this event came long before the starting date and even the desire for a statutory event of such a traditional antenna had been flying around for a couple of years in the minds of the board members. At the end, the beloved main organiser, Nestor Saura, made the most of himself so as to develop a fully guaranteed and economically profitable event for the local. organising team was made, the corresponding people showed up and everything started to roll with the typical problems of statutory event preparation. Nevertheless, the biggest challenge was not just working among the local team, but working along with the Content Team, the Strategic Committee and the Comité Directeur altogether, knowing little by little which functions corresponded to each of the teams.

During the preparation of the project, some duties such as fundraising were essential so as to procure the best development possible for the upcoming event. Conversations were established with institutions from all over the province who were seeking support for the conference. Always relating to the main topic of social inclusion, focussing as much as possible on the Focus Areas which exist within the Strategic Plan 2020-2023. At the same time, communications were being developed with bigger and smaller companies and corporations, looking for branding and sponsorship which could raise awareness on a local and regional level.

Meanwhile, the whole Content Team had to start working hard in their duties, searching for speakers and proponents for the various topics.

When it was finally chosen at Spring Agora Bucuresti 2019, everybody in AEGEE-Barcelona started to shout out of joy and happiness, despite knowing that the hard work started that very moment. The Opven Call for the

“Organising the Conference for the EPM Barcelona 2020 was a great experience and we’re also very glad that we had this opportunity to develop ourselves, taking a new challenge and learning a lot in the way”, the team states.

Despite the great experience and the success of the whole conference, the team had to face some issues along the way while finding the corresponding experts. The team addresses that ‘the biggest problem was the last-minute cancellation from some of our speakers’, an issue for which they were prepared. Despite that, everything regarding the topics went well and everyone enjoyed the delivered sessions, the participation and the general learning atmosphere. The fair prepared by this team was also very interesting and improved the engagement and collaboration among everyone participating in the event. Thus, it shall also be taken into account the impressive work made by the Strategic Committee, who were responsible for the drafting of objectives in cooperation with every group involved in the preparation of the event.

As stated from their side all groups managed to draft actions and indicators for their Focus Areas, some of them even skipped the group picture and coffee breaks. Participants raised their voices on topics such as social justice, mental health, youth rights, sexual harassment and other deep complex topics. This shows how much effort they put into the development of the proposed objectives for the event, even setting a starting point for a future pilot EPM, which could enhance the influence of such a conference.As for the social program itself, coordinated in cooperation with the Safe Person project, the participants were provided everyday with an alternative session to the disco plan, mostly focusing on board games and films in which the main topic was always related to the conference. It happened to be yet another way of developing ideas even further within an informal atmosphere.

It goes without saying that the whole team of organisers from AEGEE-Barcelona together with the Content Team, the Strategy Committee and the Comité Directeur were absolutely proud and satisfied of how the event ended up going. It was hard but yet truly productive. A big applause goes to each and every person who delivered the workshops and also the ones attending and making them so fruitful.

The whole organising team hopes that this can be a starting point for the future of AEGEE, likely to be filled with difficulties and problems from which the association will learn and grow even stronger. The team will be available for advice to the upcoming EPMs’ organising teams in order to help them improve while having a wonderful time. See you soon somewhere in Europe.