Internal Engineering Students’ Society Operations:

• Training Seminars 

• For Volunteers focusing on various leadership topics, Engineering Clubs will also be able to join in as well!

• Topics include:

  • Authentic Leadership

  • Burnout — What is it? What does it look like? And why should I be afraid?

  • Effective Communication

  • Active Listening

  • Public Speaking

• Training Videos 

• Basic event set-up

• GEER Store Operations

• Camera Operation

• Timelines for Portfolios

• Timelines provide a rough skeleton and an insight into how busy one’s schedule might be. By having a rough idea of when events should occur, it gives the volunteer team appropriate time to plan and schedule events

• Having a timeline of events & services will also allow for the various Engineering Clubs to have an idea of when the ESS will be hosting events and to allow them to potentially join in and collaborate or to avoid clashing events

• Open Office Hours:

• The ESS is huge, and as the representatives of ALL Undergraduate Engineering Students, ESS Executives should be available to talk with Students and directly engage with them.

• MecE 5 as a location is not a common space that the everyday student knows about. It is important to have the ESS executive members be in a common space where it is easy for your regular everyday student to approach them (Or even Club Members) to answer any questions!

• Inventory:

• Going through and recording what is in the ESS Inventory at least once a year. The ESS has multiple storage rooms, and hosts multiple complex events with many items. As such, it is important that the ESS is sustainable and reuses materials as much as they can before buying new items. 

• Capital Investments:

• The ESS runs multiple events, as such it is important to start looking into longer term and sustainable items that the ESS can utilize year after year.

• Equipment Borrowing program

• The ESS itself has many items that clubs and groups will ask for from time to time. Seeing that the ESS does not always use these items, it makes sense to be able to lend out some of these items (pending VP Approval) to the discipline clubs!

Advocacy:

• Multi-year Strategic plan for the ESS:

• Focusing on the direction and growth that the ESS should be going into. The ESS itself is a huge organization that manages multiple events and services that serves the UofA Engineering Students.

• The strategic plan would be consulted with various stakeholders and brought to students for feedback & ideas!

• Work alongside the Research and Advocacy Team to go through the annual general surveys both before and post Covid to determine changes in the student experience and to build our strategic plan. 

• Orientation / GEER 101:

• Continuing on-going efforts related to Orientation & expanding programming.

• Programming to include: Inclusive Language, Panels with upper year students, Coop experiences, EDI.

• Working alongside Discipline Clubs and Project groups to increase visibility and importance of getting involved early / figuring out one’s passion in Engineering.

• Town Halls:

• The Annual General Survey that the ESS releases covers a lot of important topics and provides concrete data and suggestions from students that allows the ESS to improve & provide areas to advocate for over the years. However, it does take time to prepare and process these responses. 

• Hosting a town hall once a semester on the other hand, allows for opinions and voices to be heard quickly and will help shape how the fall/winter semesters will look like.

• Leadership in the Lounge — Having various leadership figures at a fireside chat.

• Bringing in various Leadership members from the Faculty, Students Union, General Faculties Council and more to engage in a chat / socialize with students.

• Encourage Discipline Club Executives to also collaborate with their Departments.

ESS Divisions:

Academics & Services:

• Soft skills and technical skills workshops — with a potential to collaborate with Discipline Clubs:

• Workshops include:

• First Aid

• Coding

• Symmetry

• AutoCAD

• Solid Works

• Program Solving

• Critical Thinking

• Emotional Intelligence

• Fail Forward Panel Series

Bringing in Alumni or Professionals to share stories about their Career Failures and LEssons learned while focusing on professional growth.

External:

• Adopt an Alumni - Mentorship Program:

• Assign 3rd/4th/5th year students to alumni mentors such as Engineers in Training or Professional Engineers who share similar career interests/ paths to learn more about life outside of school.

Communications:

• Monthly graphics on “What has your ESS Done”

• Awareness campaign on Major events that impact the community including:

• National Engineering Month

• École Polytechnique massacre

• And many more

• ESS Timelines

Collaborations:

• Collaborating more with Project Groups, Discipline Clubs & Faculty Associations across the UofA Campus

• This past year, as Co-VP Social Events, we were able to collaborate with different groups across campus with varying social events. Students boasted about loving the collaborations and being able to network more with students outside their usual circles.

• Having attended previous collaboration events such as mixers, conferences and competitions, collaborating with other students promotes teamwork, critical thinking, and boosts our student life experience & Community on campus