Blog: A good vibe and a home base

Alma Schaafstal shares her experiences on building a strong vibe and home base for Creative Technology in Amsterdam.

A good vibe and a home base

The past few weeks were partly vacation weeks, offering time for reflection and moments of contemplation about the next steps in establishing the bi-location. My reflection mostly revolved around the identity of CreaTe and the fact that a program is so much more than, to put it simply, the curriculum and the education and examination regulations. It’s about the vibe, the community, and what we need to do to create a sense of togetherness. I also better understood why I get so happy when our students enjoy their Monday afternoon drinks together in the sunshine outside.

The reflection also focused on the mindset of CreaTe and its students. How you can always approach each other when you're uncertain about something. That we're not all the same, but we can all be ourselves within CreaTe. My reflection also touched on how CreaTe students want to be relevant to society, how passionate our teachers are about the program, and how proud we are to be part of CreaTe. A key unifying factor in all of this is, at least, our SmartXP. It is our home base, our lab with a sense of identity, supported by our fantastic technician, Alfred. Moreover, it is the home of the student association. Beautiful, but still tied to Enschede.

A sense of community

So, how do we create that vibe and sense of community in CreaTe Amsterdam as well? And no, it doesn't have to and won’t be the same as in Enschede, but we do hope that the sense of identity, community and togetherness will develop in Amsterdam too. The recent visit by delegations from Amsterdam to our facilities in Enschede certainly helped with that. The visitors from Amsterdam saw the importance of a solid foundation, in the form of a dedicated space, for the CreaTe@VU students, and they also recognised the importance of a passionate technician who understands the group. And so, we’re a few steps closer to our goal. Despite, or perhaps thanks to, the vacation.