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1. ŠKIS - GENERAL INFORMATION
2. ŠKIS’ ROLE IN STUDENT ORGANISING
3. ŠKIS STRUCTURE
4. ŠKIS OFFICES
5. ŠKIS PROJECTS & EVENTS
6. HOW TO BECOME A MEMBER OF ŠKIS?
1. ŠKIS - GENERAL INFORMATION
The ŠKIS association is an umbrella organisation of student clubs in Slovenia. It represents the interests and defends the rights of 55 student clubs across Slovenia, from Jesenice in the north to Bela Krajina in the south, and from Lendava in the east to Piran at the coast. Since its creation in 1993, ŠKIS has been helping student clubs with their projects, giving them advice and preparing educational workshops for their members. ŠKIS represents the student clubs in the Student Organisation of Slovenia (ŠOS). It hereby ensures the coordinated development of local student organising.
Local student organising in Slovenia is very strongly developed. This phenomenon is quite unique in Europe and worldwide. The vision of ŠKIS is to stimulate people never to stop learning and to encourage independent student clubs to produce and realise their ideas, based on the principle of a non-stop transfer of knowledge.
ŠKISOPIS is the name of ŠKIS’ online newspaper, in which members of student clubs can post articles, centred on themes such as events or higher education. Usually, ŠKIS publishes a yearbook once a year in which the student clubs and their projects are presented.
2. ŠKIS’ ROLE IN STUDENT ORGANISING
Student organising in Slovenia is composed of four pillars:
- ŠOU LJ - Student Organisation of University of Ljubljana
- ŠOUM - Student Organisation of University of Maribor
- ŠOUP - Student Organisation of University of Primorska
- ŠKIS - Slovenia's Student clubs Association
3. ŠKIS STRUCTURE
ŠKIS is divided into four parts:
1. Head of the organisation
a. President: he /she leads the organisation
b. Vice president
2. Executive board
a. Office for Higher Education
b. Office for High School Students
c. Office for Health and Social Affairs
d. International Office
3. Operational board: organises projects, supervises them, comes up with new ideas
4. Supervising bodies: monitors ŠKIS activities and student clubs
a. Supervisory committee
b. Security council
4. ŠKIS OFFICES
Office for Higher Education
The Higher Education Committee deals with all the issues that are related to higher education systems and students. It focuses on national legislation in domains such as law, the higher education financing system, on student rights and student involvement in university governance, etc. On a number of these and other issues it also cooperates closely with our umbrella organisation, the Student Organisation of Slovenia (ŠOS).
Office for High school students in Slovenia
The main task of this office is to encourage activity among all high school students and to connect different aspects of high school student life within student clubs. We believe that once the goal of continually having well-experienced members in student clubs is accomplished, activities of ŠKIS will reach an even higher level. This office also cooperates with the School Student organisation of Slovenia and is currently preparing some projects for the future.
Office for health and social affairs
ŠKIS is aware of the fact that a lot of young people face several difficulties while becoming grown-up people. That is why ŠKIS organises projects such as ŠKISova štorklja (a project for young students with children), Jem zdravo torej sem študent (a project about healthy nutrition), Krvavi torek (an event where students from all over Slovenia can donate blood) and the project Virus (a project in cooperation with medical students which alerts people about the HIV virus). ŠKIS also plays an active role in the project called KAJPAMI.SI, aimed at solving employment problems of fresh graduates.
The International Office...
As international cooperation is an important factor, ŠKIS established an International Office in 2004. The members of the International Office strive to maintain and establish new links with similar youth organizations in Europe. They do this by sharing examples of good practices, including organising seminars, exchanges and other projects and attend various lectures, several among them organised within the Youth in Action programme. Using the obtained experience and knowledge, its members can expand their horizons, discover new people and new partner organisations. All this new information, new ideas, thoughts and ways of coping with the problems are then transferred towards the student clubs. The clubs are informed about upcoming youth exchanges, training and other activities.
Members of the International Office and other people who work at ŠKIS participated in several international events: the European/African Youth Summit in Lisbon (2007), the European Students Convention in Lisbon (2007), the International Conference on Quality Assurance in Higher Education (2007), regional conferences in Struga and Ohrid (2007) and the ISWIB conference in Belgrade (2007). ŠKIS also took part in organising a project called “Crossing Borders” going across Slovakia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Austria and Slovenia by bike (2007).
Link: The International Office
5. ŠKIS PROJECTS & EVENTS
Projects on national level
The major project organised by ŠKIS is called Škisova tržnica or ŠKIS fair. It is the greatest Slovenian one-day open air student event. On the market stands, student clubs present their projects, events, newspapers, cuisine, etc. In the evening, participants and visitors can enjoy a concert with well-known music groups.
The ŠTUNF festival is the second biggest project of ŠKIS. This cultural student festival is organised every year in a different city in cooperation between ŠKIS and a local student club. Through this event, ŠKIS wants to offer young people the support and encouragement to organise cultural and artistic activities. It wants to stimulate a constant flow of new ideas and thoughts in this field, and to promote the idea of freedom of artistic expression. It also wants to highlight the current state of youth culture and the visibility of it in Slovenian regions and cities.
The main goal of the Škisov seminar is to provide vital information to the active members of student clubs. Main topics of the seminar are EU funds, the Youth In Action programme and the history of the student organisation. During the seminar there are workshops about team work, motivation, conflict solving and PR. More than 100 participants from different student clubs took part in last year’s seminar.
ŠKISgol is a football tournament between student clubs. Match locations change every week. The best teams face each other in a final tournament. ŠKISkoš is a similar tournament for basketball.
ŠKISov troboj is an event with as main objective bonding together active members of different student clubs through pub sports. More than 50 club members took part in the last triathlon and had fun while playing bowling, pool and darts.
Vsi na ŠKIs - All on ŠKIs targets clubs and its active members and all who tend to enjoy skiing and snowboarding or to participate in any other winter activity on snow. It also offers aprogramme for non-skiing participants.
Škisova štorklja - Škis’ stork is a project which targets students with children. It saw birth in 2006 when ŠKIS organised a competition for the best journal article written by a student mom or dad. At the end of 2007, a photography competition electing the best baby picture made by student parents was held.
Škisovi dnevi zdrave prehrane - Škis’ days of healthy food:
The idea for this project emerged as a response to the dramatic state of eating habits among the student population. Its priority is to change the current situation of unhealthy eating habits. A milestone was reached in the student dormitories in Ljubljana where students were offered yoghurts, muesli, cereals, wholemeal bread and fruit and were showed that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. The project also included an evening seminar about eating healthy. It was concluded by an international youth exchange "The importance of healthy nutrition among students" in March 2010.
Krvodajalski teden - Blood donating week:
There is a constant demand of blood, and club members are well aware of this situation. Bearing in mind the high student population in university cities, ŠKIS association has started a project named Bloody Tuesday where students are invited to donate this vital fluid.
http://www.castimkri.si/
IZOPOP is an event that offers educational afternoons on topics such as time management, public relations, foreign languages, etc.
Sejem rabljenih učbenikov – Second-hand book fair
The event aims at providing better prices for study material, primarily to elementary and secondary school children and their parents. By the exchange of books at low prices, ŠKIS wants to promote solidarity and wants to offer the possibility of a cheap but quality purchase.
Transnational projects
Competitive Edge, a Youth in Action 4.4 project which took place in 2008 and 2009, was a project aiming at developing the “competitiveness” of young leaders and active members, by means of innovative training tools, educational modules and web applications. Four countries participated in the 18-month-project: Czech Republic, Hungary, Lithuania and Slovenia; all of them with experience on various levels and range of activities in their countries, with a history of active participation in civil society.
http://www.competitive.si/en/
As a part of ŠKIS fair 2007 we organised a project called the European village, where members of seven countries presented their national cuisine and culture.
Our members participate in a lot of exchanges which take place in European countries such as Sweden, Greece, Finland, Turkey, France, Italy, Poland, Lithuania and many others...
Beside getting a lot of experience and knowledge from other organisations and getting to know new people and partners, one of the most important things when participating on the international level is also sharing our knowledge, our ways of thinking and our way of organising with other young people around Europe. In 2007 we also hosted an EVS volunteer from Hungary, who helped us with our projects and shared her experience of youth organisations with us.
Korte: What kind of free time will you choose?
The main theme of the multilateral international youth exchange which took place from 21st to 29th September 2009 at “Korte”, Slovenia and which united 31 participants from Russia, Macedonia, Poland, Spain and Slovenia, was dedicated to the creative ways of spending free time. The principal question was: How creative spending of free time influences the social integrity of the young and, on the contrary, how the social and economic environment affects the modes of spending free time? Through different activities and workgroups young participants got to know different possibilities of spending free time in differently developed countries, the influence of economic standards and the role of European politics on this subject, the use and access to internet in mentioned environments, different aspects of sport and also different »traps« related to negative ways of spending free time...
http://skis-zveza.si/
6. HOW TO BECOME A MEMBER OF ŠKIS?
It is very simple: you have to be a student; you have to be motivated and have a lot of ideas; if you have that, go to your local student club and join our organisation. Every individual who is active in his/her local student club can in the course of time become a member of the ŠKIS association, but he/she has to be elected to the position he/she is applying for. Or he/she can join one of the offices as a member – a non-elected function – if interested. All the members who are elected to the positions of the executive board, operational board, supervisory committee or security council are given a one-year mandate. These people are also responsible for representing students and their interests vis-à-vis other student and youth organisations and of course the government.