Invitation to Erasmus+ student exhibitions: Ideas for social enterprises in Arnhem/Lingewaard

Everyone is invited to attend the public student exhibitions on Friday May 12 from 15:00 – 17:30 in room D005 at VHL Velp. On Saturday May 13 from 13:00-15:00, there will be a second public student exhibition in the aula in De Malburcht (Graslaan 97, Arnhem)  where everyone is invited for as well. Students will present their ideas for social enterprises that create added value for Malburgen (Arnhem) and Lingewaard in relation to the local food landscape.

A selection of international students enrolled in the 2017 version of the online course Social Entrepreneurship for Local Change (which kicked off March 16) will participate in the Erasmus+ Intensive Program (IP) Social Entrepreneurship for Local Change in Velp and Arnhem. On May 5, a group of 25 students from VHL’s project partner institutes from Estonia, Germany and Romania will arrive in Arnhem. By the end of the IP, 15 visiting staff members from the project partners institutes from these three countries will have participated in the IP as well. The IP is organized by VHL lecturers Judith Jobse and Daan van der Linde and landscape architect, Jeroen de Vries, who recently retired from VHL, in collaboration with the EU project partners, the municipality of Arnhem and many other stakeholders in Malburgen and Lingewaard. The IP is (partially) funded by the Erasmus+ grant program for Strategic Partnerships in Higher Education of the European Union.

The main idea behind the IP is that it creates a learning environment that encourages innovation and 'out of the box thinking' using a ‘cooker-pressure’ format. Confronted with an unknown environment the participants will be asked to identify social opportunities linked to environmental issues in cooperation with fellow students. Design thinking and lean start-up methodologies are applied as a way to support (potential) entrepreneurs to stimulate their creative processes. The output which students have to create in groups is a viable business idea which also offers added value to a targeted social area of interest of this group and the quality of the environment. A central theme in this Intensive Program is regional and sustainable food.

In the weekend of May 6 and 7, the visiting students will work together with VHL students in multidisciplinary and multicultural teams in the district Malburgen (Arnhem) and in the municipality of Lingewaard. The group will gather at the community center De Malburcht and together with IP staff they will undertake urban safari’s on Saturday. On Sunday the group will meet with Marjolein Mulder (Community team coordinator Malburgen, municipality of Arnhem) and several social entrepreneurs active in Arnhem.  On Monday May 8, the group will arrive for the first time at the estate of Larenstein where they will participate in workshops like Design thinking and Business plan development. The final presentations are on May 12 and 13 and on Saturday afternoon May 13 the IP will be finalized and visiting students and staff will start to travel back to their respective homes again.

For questions or more information email: [email protected]
or check: localchange.eu / Facebook.com