Overview
Organised Events
In the 2020 autumn semester, we organised the following events:
- Member recruitment: Information event, Freshers’ Rally
- City Rally: Tour In Turicum
- Wikiday
- Watch Party for online Autumn Congress by Munich in Affoltern
- Hackathon: SK[AI] IS THE LIMIT! (online)
- Alumni Chäääs (online)
- Pub Quiz (online)
- Member Meetings every 2 weeks, first in person, later online due to Covid
Covid Victims
The following planned events fell victim to Covid:
- Halloween SitSit (a Finnish student tradition)
- weekend in the mountains
- ski weekend before the start of the semester
- (all international events)
Local Activities
After a summer without any major coronavirus-related restrictions, EESTEC LC Zurich started the new semester motivated. Like all AMIV members, we regretted the absence of ESW, ESF, etc., but decided to make the best of the situation.
So we attended the Erstiralley at Platspitz as usual, and held a big information meeting in the 2nd week of term, this year simply without the ESF afterwards. Beforehand, there was a kick-off member meeting for long-standing members with sausages and beer by the lake.
On the Friday after the AMIV AGM, we organised a city tour with challenges under the name “Tour in Turicum”. Such city tours are normally organised at international events for foreign guests. As these were not available in Zurich thanks to the travel regulations in HS20, we decided to show the city to AMIV students, as first-year students in particular generally know little about the city.
Unfortunately, this was our last major live event before the regulations made it impossible to organise any more. With reduced numbers, we held a Wikiday at the end of October: experienced members updated the wiki and did other office work, new members prepared Momos, which were enjoyed together in the evening.
With the switch back to online teaching, EESTEC could only be found on Discord. However, this didn’t stop us from continuing to organise things:
On the 3rd weekend in October, we had our hackathon “SK[AI] IS THE LIMIT!” in which 13 teams demonstrated their ML skills on a practical case over one and a half days.
The traditional Alumni Fondue was rebranded to Alumni Chäääs and held at GatherTown at the end of November.
Last but not least, we prepared our members for the exam phase with a pub quiz at the end of January.
Unfortunately, we had to mourn numerous corona victims: On Halloween, a SitSit with this theme would have been planned; in December, we hoped to organise a weekend in the mountains with the surrounding German EESTEC cities; in the week before the new semester, we planned a week of skiing. There were also no live international events, of which EESTEC LC Zurich usually organises one per semester.
Events Visited Abroad Online
Although there were no live international events, the EESTEC network did not let itself get down and there were up to weekly online events. However, EESTEC LC Zurch members only attended one, the EESTEC AGM, the Autumn Congress 2020 at the beginning of November. Instead of meeting in Munich as planned, we mainly met in Affoltern. During the day we represented LC Zurich at the General Meetings, in the evening we ate molten cheese.
Plans for the Next Semester
At the beginning of next semester, we will be organising another hackathon, the EESTech Challenge, online. This year’s theme is cybersecurity, where participants will get the chance to spend a day in a team competing against the clock to solve a problem from the real world of work.
Further events are being planned, but unfortunately, we cannot guarantee anything due to the unclear situation. We will of course inform you on our communication channels, in case of doubt just contact the e-mail below. What is certain, however, is that LC Zurich and its board are and will remain motivated and continue to make the best of the situation.
However, we already have concrete plans for the autumn semester 21! The aim is to organise a congress (Autumn General Meeting of EESTEC) in Zurich! You can find out more in our Autumn General Meeting proposal which is submitted to the AMIV general assembly!
Get Involved
Are you confident and do you like talking to companies at eye level to raise sponsorship money? Or are you creative and keen to contribute your ideas to our planning? Or do you like coming up with unusual ideas for parties? Or are you simply cosmopolitan and would like to give our European guests the best impression of Switzerland after the pandemic?
Of course, you can also visit one of the many events abroad free of charge. You can always find the latest information at eestec.net/events. Why don’t you come to one of our fortnightly meetings and ask your questions to contact@eestec.ethz.ch or directly to us if you see one of us walking around in our bright red T-shirts/hoodies. 😉
Benjamin Stadler
Chairperson EESTEC LC Zurich
contact@eestec.ethz.ch