This year, AYY, the student union of the newly founded Aalto University in Helsinki turned five. Along with other student unions, the VSETH board went to Helsinki to congratulate them on the anniversary. What we got in return was not only a great time but also lots of inspiration.
Startup sauna and more
Among the best things we saw at Aalto University was the design factory – a prototype, but similar to the student project house at ETH. It is an experimental cooperation platform for education, research, application and design and connects business life with universities. Professors come to inspire education, students can work with heavy machinery and they can learn how to go through the process of problem solving with a product as the end result.
One great output of Aalto students is a place called ”startup sauna“. At a different location on campus, there is a building dedicated to students who want to come over and work on their project in various open spaces.
Student culture
Besides visiting Aalto University and all its special places, we also participated in AYY’s very unique student culture. Since most of the student housing is owned by AYY itself, they have an unimaginable freedom in deciding what to do with those buildings. There seems to be at least one sauna in every house. These saunas are connected to a ”hangout“ space for parties. As a group, you can reserve these spaces and have a good time. A little more public are the so-called ”club-rooms“ for different associations.
Traditional dining with a twist
And finally there was the big celebration of AYY in a dining hall including some of the most ridiculous but at the same time most entertaining traditions we have ever seen in our lives. At one point during the evening, for some reason, the stage was occupied by a boat engine painted in pink. The celebration was rounded off by a lavish brunch the next day.
Everybody decided that we need more input from our friends in the Nordic five tech. We will thus have a follow-up meeting in Denmark at DTU on the second weekend of May. Hopefully this will broaden our mind in the same way as our trip to Helsinki did. Although it may sound a bit odd, these international exchanges are extremely important in looking for unused potential in our resources. We learn new ways of approaching the same problems and see how the dynamics of traditions change drastically, if you modify certain parameters.
VSETH delegation having a speech
If you are interested in the details of our exchange and our views of certain traditions at AYY, send us an email to hallo@vseth.ethz.ch! We will be glad to tell you the whole story.
Thomas Gumbsch
President
VSETH – Verband der Studierenden an der ETH Zürich