Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
A podcast about international social work. Made by SocNet98, an European network of 18 universities that graduates students in social work. In this podcast you can listen to a broad specter of topics that is all connected to social work in an international perspective.
[SPEAKER_00]: [Automatic captions by Autotekst using OpenAI Whisper V3. May contain recognition errors.]
Welcome
to The Social Pod, a podcast brought to you by SockNet98, a network of
[SPEAKER_00]: universities sharing the common interest for social work in an
international perspective. Hello, hello. This is Feli. And this is
[SPEAKER_01]: Daniel. We are organizers of the IUW 2026 in Jena with our professor
Frederik von Habu. And we want to talk about our experience on how the IOW
[SPEAKER_00]: was for us and how it was organizing it. And yeah, what we struggled with,
what we enjoyed. And yeah, what was most challenging. I'm excited to
[SPEAKER_00]: talk with you about it. Yeah, I'm excited too. Maybe in advance, our
biggest coping strategy was humor. So maybe we're going to laugh in this
[SPEAKER_01]: podcast a bit. But besides that, yeah, we have a lot of points to talk
about and we're quite excited to share them with you. Yes. So Daniel and I
[SPEAKER_00]: were both students at the Ernst Abbe University of Applied Sciences in
Jena. So we were the student organizers that were doing the IOW. And
[SPEAKER_00]: yeah. Exactly. How many weeks is it ago now, Daniel? that the iow uh iow
ended yeah um it's um four weeks ago nearly it's the 19th of may when we're
[SPEAKER_01]: recording it and it all began with the arrival on the 19th of april so it's
a month ago um but that's not uh when iow really started for us but it
[SPEAKER_01]: started in August last year, one could say, when we began our jobs as
student assistants at the Faculty of Social Work at the Ernst Abbe
[SPEAKER_01]: University and Frederik from Habu. He was our boss, one could say. The
Erasmus coordinator. And he has been part of Sognet1908 for multiple
[SPEAKER_01]: years.
[SPEAKER_01]: the past years since he's the Erasmus coordinator so he already had a bit
of information about it and then there were there was also another
[SPEAKER_01]: student assistant who was organizing first things like clarifying
where the students could sleep so the hostel or asking for some first
[SPEAKER_01]: field visit ideas and organizations if they could during the week. And
that was kind of the point where we took over then in August 2025. Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for the background information. What was your picture of the
IOW when you first started working in August? How did you imagine it to
[SPEAKER_00]: be? Do you feel like it turned out the way you imagined it at the
beginning? Yeah. Or can you, maybe you have a thought about that? Yeah,
[SPEAKER_01]: that's an interesting question. I mean, for me, getting this job and,
yeah, this idea of organizing an international event was something...
[SPEAKER_01]: I wanted to connect back to my Erasmus, me, because the spring term
before I got the job, so spring term 2025, I was in Sweden. And I had such an
[SPEAKER_01]: amazing time getting into this international bubble, into that field,
international exchange, that I just wanted to keep that feeling alive.
[SPEAKER_01]: And also to make it possible for other students except me to experience
that. So this was my motivation and I saw really...
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I was really excited to get that into practice. Still, it wasn't
really imaginable how much of organizing it is. And also kind of how big
[SPEAKER_01]: and immersive this week would be exactly when it happened. How was it for
you?
[SPEAKER_00]: As you know, I also lived abroad for a while already and I really enjoy
having that international feeling, bringing people together,
[SPEAKER_00]: exchanging perspectives and getting information. different views on
our topic that we had um so i was quite excited um also working with you
[SPEAKER_00]: guys and um i'm really proud of what we did until yeah until now And so our
topic this year was democracy and human rights. And so our preparation
[SPEAKER_00]: for the week was surrounded all by this topic. Okay. And, yeah, what do
you remember was, what did you start with preparing? What do you feel
[SPEAKER_00]: like was something that took most of the time? What was the beginning of
the preparation? Yeah. Mostly administrative work in the beginning,
[SPEAKER_00]: right? It was only administrative until the week, basically. So all the
preparations. So what do you think about it? What was the biggest or the
[SPEAKER_00]: first thing? Oh, I mean, those are multiple questions. The first thing I
remember...
[SPEAKER_01]: I think it was that we had to get an idea of the program itself because
there's always the coordinators meeting, the Erasmus coordinators
[SPEAKER_01]: meeting from Sognet 98 in autumn, like in October or so. And we needed to
have a program at that time so that the others knew what they could expect
[SPEAKER_01]: from the week in Jena. And that's why we tried to clarify different
points like where to stay. how to arrive um also um how many workshop
[SPEAKER_01]: slots we would like to have during the week and um yeah which field visits
to organize um to have like um yeah guided tour in weimar so we really
[SPEAKER_01]: needed at that point to to get an idea of um of the program okay So the frame
of the week was something that was giving us a plan. Yeah, exactly,
[SPEAKER_01]: exactly. And that was something we could then take on and work on during
the next month in my experience. Yeah. That also gave me safety and
[SPEAKER_00]: confidence.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we had the week and we knew we had like some ideas on what to do on which
day. And
[SPEAKER_00]: so we had some plans, but to do the background...
[SPEAKER_00]: um topics on like how administrative we do all these things how they will
work out how will we book it how will we pay it how how we will do the
[SPEAKER_00]: contracts with some of the the people that were part of the program that
was what we were still going to work on during the preparation so that's
[SPEAKER_00]: So briefly, like organizing events during the week was a one thing, but
like doing the administrative work on like how all these events could
[SPEAKER_00]: actually work out, that was the other point. Exactly. So, for example,
we needed to reserve some rooms for the week for the different
[SPEAKER_01]: workshops, for field visits, so organizations that came to the
university to present themselves. Yeah, but it turned out that the
[SPEAKER_01]: university has just other rhythms of organizing those rooms. And at
that early point, yeah, like in... autumn 2025 it was not possible yet to
[SPEAKER_01]: get these rooms so we had to wait and we had to hope that they will reserve
the rooms which they did but we were just working differently and
[SPEAKER_01]: sometimes on different points and had to realize that the university as
an administrative institution also, just works differently. And that
[SPEAKER_01]: there are so multiple people in multiple positions that are essential
to work with and that have sometimes information that you don't know in
[SPEAKER_01]: advance if you don't speak to them. Yeah, like Frederick gave us a lot of
room to be creative, to take over responsibility. And that was quite
[SPEAKER_01]: nice. I experienced it to work on the same level and not work as, I didn't
feel like student assistant for most of the time. But then I did feel like
[SPEAKER_01]: a newbie to the university when it came out that we had to
[SPEAKER_01]: ask for different types of financing stuff and so on, multiple
different departments at the university. Yeah. Yeah, there was a
[SPEAKER_00]: process. So we were learning while doing, actually. Exactly, learning
the organization somehow.
[SPEAKER_00]: That was also quite eye-opening, right? How an institution like that is
working. And that was challenging at the same time. Yeah, it's not an
[SPEAKER_01]: NGO. It's not a company. It's a public institution. And there you need to
have a lot of talkbacks, feedbacks, and you can't just do things easily,
[SPEAKER_01]: but many people need to be involved. Yeah. And so that's also a big
learning that I take away because I've organized some events in the
[SPEAKER_01]: past, but... not at a public institution yet and yeah so the week itself
started on the 19th of April and I personally remember to be super
[SPEAKER_00]: nervous and
[SPEAKER_00]: I was quite nervous to meet the students on the Sunday when they arrived.
On the Sunday, okay. Not before. The non-formal event of going for
[SPEAKER_00]: the...
[SPEAKER_00]: city tour and the restaurant and yeah I was I was nervous of like how the
week is gonna work out the way we planned it before and of meeting the
[SPEAKER_00]: people itself and And since we met the students first, before we met the
lecturers, so yeah, I was excited also. And how do you remember the first
[SPEAKER_00]: day, the Sunday? What did you think of? Like, what... were your thoughts
of what could go wrong what could be what could go right how did you feel um
[SPEAKER_01]: yeah i mean i can give even more insights than those that we want to give i
started my sunday um at the sauna so i really needed to calm down before
[SPEAKER_01]: because i was also kind of excited nervous and i knew that week that yeah i
won't get too much sleep and i will just yeah be quite enthusiastic and
[SPEAKER_01]: excited for any day that's gonna happen so um I can only give advice to
take what you need before to refill your battery. And then, yeah, same
[SPEAKER_01]: for me. I was excited. I was a bit nervous. I was like, how are these guys
going to be? Are they going to be interested in Jena? Are they going to be
[SPEAKER_01]: especially interested in each other? Or is it like now they're here?
Yeah. Yeah, especially the students from Germany. They went to Jena. Is
[SPEAKER_01]: it really so exciting? But yeah, when we met them, they had so many
questions to Jena the first evening when we had this little city tour
[SPEAKER_01]: through Jena. Yeah, they were quite curious. Exactly. So were you
scared of that we missed out on big things? I was not scared that we missed
[SPEAKER_01]: out on big things. I had the feeling that we had quite a good overview. But
I...
[SPEAKER_01]: I had the fear
[SPEAKER_01]: that things aren't going to work out the way that we planned them. Like
that the week might be too packed or that students won't be happy enough
[SPEAKER_01]: with the hostel. Because the week could only work out if everybody is
just actively participating. Exactly. Yeah, right. Exactly. And not
[SPEAKER_01]: only the one who's like taking part, but not doing anything else. But
when you come to an IOW, you really need to be an active member of it. But
[SPEAKER_01]: yeah, the students were that and the lecturers as well, of course. I
mean, they also had the workshops here and yeah, really not only
[SPEAKER_01]: participated in the week. Yeah. Yeah, true. And how was it meeting the
students for the first time? Did your worries all drop?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I think the moment I met them, the moment I saw them, they just
dropped. And yeah, I was in my Erasmus me. I was enthusiastic. I was like,
[SPEAKER_01]: nice, this week's going to be so much fun. And we're going to have so much
fun. And what I didn't realize at that point, though I knew it, Was that
[SPEAKER_01]: we're going to not have the possibility to be the ones to get too much in
contact with them. Because we were the student organizers. And that's
[SPEAKER_01]: also something that you have to keep in mind when you organize it.
That... Yeah, you're not a participant. You always have small talks,
[SPEAKER_01]: but then a phone call comes or one of your colleagues comes and says, hey,
we have to organize this. Or you just watch on your clock and then it's
[SPEAKER_01]: like, okay, time's up. I need to organize the next things. I need to get
back to the office. Indeed. You always have the tasks in your head, even
[SPEAKER_00]: though you're like in contact with the people. Yeah, true. Yeah. So in my
experience, it was mainly about creating the rooms for those people.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's also something I, yeah, I feared that we missed that, but I
think we did quite well. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I agree. So Monday was our first
[SPEAKER_00]: formal day. So there was a day when we started making theory,
becoming... practical experience um so everything that we planned
[SPEAKER_00]: theoretically like we we were checking out if they practically also
worked out the same way we planned them and um we were having our welcome
[SPEAKER_00]: event we were in the in the lecture hall and at Ernst Abbe University
[SPEAKER_00]: and so we were hoping all the technical parts were working out the rooms
were there and yeah so we also had the Eurobuffet on the Monday and And
[SPEAKER_00]: that was in the evening program. How was your experience about the
Monday? What was challenging for you and what did you enjoy?
[SPEAKER_01]: I think the challenging part was what I just told you, like, I want to be in
contact with all those inspiring new personalities, but it's not
[SPEAKER_01]: possible in that way. And I have to get back to the office all the time. But
then seeing things work out, seeing workshops work out, seeing that the
[SPEAKER_01]: European, though we planned it outside and it was a rainy day, was
possible to get that into the the entrance hall of Ernst Abbe
[SPEAKER_01]: University, by contacting the administration, the facility manager.
That was really cool, seeing things work out. But then, yeah, we also did
[SPEAKER_01]: not plan quite well how many people we would need to... Like do simple
tasks that you maybe don't think about because you're so topic related
[SPEAKER_01]: like doing the dishes and so on. Then we had some engaged students who
just helped us out and that was quite cool. And also seeing that this
[SPEAKER_01]: works out and that there are solutions. There was also an interesting
experience from the first day. So what you just said about the
[SPEAKER_00]: Eurobuffet, I feel like flexibility was one of the key words that were
accompanied
[SPEAKER_00]: us. I'm missing out the English words. I'm sorry. So that actually we're
like being part of the whole week, the word flexibility, right? Yeah. It
[SPEAKER_01]: was, it was. So Tuesday,
[SPEAKER_00]: that was our Weimar day. Exactly. So the city near Jena. And we started
with organizing each and every one at the train station. So we were
[SPEAKER_00]: having tickets for five people always. Five people tickets. And we
would have to find groups of five at the train station. We took away from
[SPEAKER_00]: that day that so much... Time...
[SPEAKER_00]: Time... Puffer. Das ist ein Puffer. Englisch. Time... Puffer.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that you should plan to have plenty of time. Spare time, maybe. Spare
time? I don't know. Okay. Some gap minutes.
[SPEAKER_01]: Cope with humor, even in podcast situations. Yeah, we need to have them
during the day. Because sometimes some of them are the first time
[SPEAKER_00]: abroad. I mean, Jena is not the biggest city, but there can always come up
some challenges for people. So having spare time before an event is
[SPEAKER_00]: going to start or like we have to get a train. Also, I found out that's
really important. Yes, don't tell the people to take the last train to go
[SPEAKER_01]: to a place, but tell them to take a train earlier because some will miss
that and then they can take the later arriving train.
[SPEAKER_00]: So what was your experience about the Weimar days? weimar day the weimar
day was quite an interesting day um because um yeah there were two um
[SPEAKER_01]: especially historical events um that are related to our week and um yeah
so we had a guided tour guided tour at um yeah to weimar city center mainly
[SPEAKER_01]: themed to the weimar republic and then also when thuringia yeah went
national socialist and the national socialists took over and then on
[SPEAKER_01]: the afternoon we had the buchenwald concentration camp memorial visit
also with guided tour So it was also historically quite packed. And
[SPEAKER_00]: emotionally packed. And emotionally packed. So we also communicated
to the people to not go to Buchenwald if they don't feel like that. Yes. of
[SPEAKER_01]: course it was an important visit for us because, um, you could see, um,
how important human rights really are today and to defend them. But then
[SPEAKER_01]: it's also quite important to, um, to have an emotional, um, sensitive
way of, um, of hosting those events. Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, indeed. Um,
[SPEAKER_00]: So also a thing that was a bit difficult or challenging at Buchenwerb was
the logistics with the transportation. Exactly. Do you remember the
[SPEAKER_01]: bus? Yeah, there was no private bus we booked in advance, but we thought
that we might all… Fit in the public bus. Exactly. That's only going
[SPEAKER_01]: like… I mean, once an hour departing from Buchenwald, but it was also
like only with half an hour spare time departing different buses from
[SPEAKER_01]: Weimar city center. So yeah, it would have been maybe better to plan in
advance. It all worked out. We all fit in it. But yeah, there was
[SPEAKER_01]: something that we really for a short time had to cope with. And it was a
challenge for a moment. Like there were many challenges for a moment.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like the time, hopefully it's not, there's something in the back.
Please ignore it. In the background? In the background, exactly.
[SPEAKER_01]: Listen to the background. It's not us. It's something different. We are
recording right next to the street in a room, not on the street, but right
[SPEAKER_01]: next to it. And that was also the guided tours in Weimar. And in the first
moment, one of the tour guides had a car accident. So she was not
[SPEAKER_01]: available for the first few minutes. And we thought, okay, then we might
have just two tours. But then she arrived later and so on. Things
[SPEAKER_01]: happened to solve themselves, but there was a lot of tension at that
moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I feel like it was only positive feedback also from that day. Yeah, it
was only positive feedback. The people were quite excited to get all
[SPEAKER_01]: that insights in German history. And also visiting beautiful Weimar.
Exactly. Exactly. And also getting, visiting more places. Exactly.
[SPEAKER_00]: That are like a symbol for fighting for democracy. Yeah, right, right.
So Wednesday was our next day. We had the supervision on how the students
[SPEAKER_00]: were experiencing their Weimar experience. We had someone from our
university here that was organizing that talk and she also studied
[SPEAKER_00]: international communication and Yeah, so we're talking about
emotions, how we experienced them. She did a Mentimeter, where she was
[SPEAKER_00]: asking questions and the students could answer anonymous how they
felt, what they struggled with.
[SPEAKER_00]: If they already knew about this, this
[SPEAKER_00]: field or these institutions in Germany are not… Concentration camps,
you mean. And also… if it's okay to not know how to feel in these
[SPEAKER_00]: situations.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because it can also be overwhelming. And maybe you feel like you should
have a certain feeling at that point, but maybe you don't have it. So how
[SPEAKER_00]: should I feel? How can I feel? How am I allowed to feel? Yeah, that was
really nice. It should have been longer. We were only having 50 minutes
[SPEAKER_00]: for it. So that's also a key takeaway from IOW is to... to have lots of gaps
in between the events and to also make them maybe even half an hour
[SPEAKER_00]: longer, each of them. And if they are shorter, then they have some time to
talk about it afterwards for some point, for some time. How do you think
[SPEAKER_01]: about that? Yeah, I totally agree. I think many of the workshops would
have also been a bit more deeper if they just would have had more time. But
[SPEAKER_01]: then the same day we also had the field visits in the afternoon and I think
it was just an hour or so because we also packed the picture in between. uh
[SPEAKER_01]: the workshops and the field visits and the lunch and for anybody out
there plan where and when you want to take the picture and don't take it at
[SPEAKER_01]: the point where it's only one hour for lunch because people need time to
eat people need time to discuss and to talk and to just chat with each
[SPEAKER_01]: other because that's also what iuw is about And then the field visits,
they were quite nice. We had five opportunities to go to different
[SPEAKER_01]: places. And I really
[SPEAKER_01]: enjoyed to have those opportunities. Although two of them were at the
university because we had also institutions that were presenting
[SPEAKER_01]: themselves here. Yeah, but many of those students, they were quite
happy afterwards. I think it was just a little bit something we cannot
[SPEAKER_01]: predict the weather, right? And the one thing that we, both of us, were
part of was a tour to a village nearby or a smaller city, Kala. And it was
[SPEAKER_01]: quite hot that day, so... Also again flexibility and being spontaneous
that was quite helpful because you just got us some ice cream and I think
[SPEAKER_01]: that lightened the mood a bit again. Also, you remember that the
workshops were also... No, for the workshops, the lectures. Also, they
[SPEAKER_00]: were saying that they wanted maybe to have more time for them. So we only
had time periods of one and a half hours. And some of them were hoping
[SPEAKER_00]: for... either like having their workshop like twice a week maybe so they
can also participate and in other workshops that were not so they were at
[SPEAKER_00]: the same time so they could join it at a different day or to um yeah to make
them longer maybe So, yes. Exactly. And then the field visits were also
[SPEAKER_01]: part of the Thursday reflection. But yeah, also a takeaway, if you have
enough gap time, spare time, it's just not necessary to have everything
[SPEAKER_01]: done. being planned in advance and to have a reflection slot that's
formal on every topic. But then we also had a nice other program in the
[SPEAKER_01]: evening of Thursday, I guess. Yes, we had the farewell party. There was
just... It was awesome seeing everyone just like already being so well
[SPEAKER_00]: connected with each other and that there also have been friendships
made during the week between the lecturers and between the students.
[SPEAKER_00]: And Exactly. Family faces to everybody. And hearing that, that they
connected, that was quite nice. Because, of course, yeah, Felicitas,
[SPEAKER_01]: Frederick and me, we also connected. But as organizers, we didn't
really, yeah, came into the opportunity of having too much contact with
[SPEAKER_01]: them. But then seeing them all enthusiastic and giving us feedback that
they really liked our enthusiasm, our energy, our positiveness and our
[SPEAKER_01]: helpfulness, that was quite nice. Yes. Yeah, I hope they're going to
stay connected even after IOW. I hope so too. But I'm sure they can change
[SPEAKER_00]: numbers. Yeah. If you are an engaged student organizer, that will
happen. Yes. Thank you guys for listening. Yeah, we hope you took some
[SPEAKER_01]: key points away in between the lines. And yeah. Have a good time. If you
have any questions, text us. Text us or just go on LinkedIn or so. I think
[SPEAKER_01]: you can find us there if it's not too cringe to say that. Yeah. Have a good
time being part of IOW and see you in the future.