Teambuilding weekend with the board
In the weekend of the 15th of August, we gathered with eight EUROAVIA Leuven board members deep in the Belgian forests for a two-day team building initiative. This was a first for our association, designed to strengthen collaboration and foster camaraderie between old and new members. Ralph, our new President, came up with the idea to make being part of the organizing board more appealing for interested members. Finding successors for our association was the next challenge we had to tackle after finding participants for our events and sponsors to improve our financial situation.
We kicked the first evening off with an Aerospace-branded quiz where each of the members prepared their own round to challenge each other’s knowledge about planes and planets. We kept track of our results with a coin-based scoring system. This system was kept for all the activities to maintain competitive engagement throughout the weekend. After the quiz, we ended the evening with a high-stakes poker session and expected a good night’s sleep afterwards.
Nothing could be further from the truth however; at 5:00 AM we were all abruptly woken up with a trumpet call and needed to present ourselves in a neat line in front of the house. What followed was a grueling morning where we had to run 4km in group and battle each other in dodgeball and a “capture the flag” game, all while competing for coins. For the last activity before noon, we had to find the coordinates of our next meeting place. To make the task even harder, we were split in two teams and had to communicate with walkie-talkies. These activities were perfect to bond with the other board members through shared suffering.
After an afternoon nap, we left our cabin for a last time for a tranquil kayaking session along the Ourthe river. On the way back to Leuven, we stopped for a walk in the picturesque village of Durbuy and for our final dinner at a cozy restaurant. There, we counted our coins and decided who was the winner. Originally, the person who got the most coins would not have to pay anything for their stay, but the group decided together to split this prize among all participants. This shows that we achieved what we set out to do; to create a strong bond between all board members.
Initiatives such as this one exemplify what EUROAVIA stands for: cultivating a community where members actively support one another and grow together. We extend our appreciation to all participants who contributed to making this weekend a success.
Written by Ralph Bogaert and Mattias Vermeersch