Tag Archives: cultural

Integration through Cultural Education

Colorful multi-cultural integration concept tree set. Vector file layered for easy manipulation and custom coloring.

 

An individual’s social background is compounded partly by education and social interaction. Especially, cultural education is crucial in regards to integration into the society. Various programs, such as diverse arts and cultural workshops, within education have its importance in not only expanding the mind but also educating and supporting children and teenager.

Studies show that students who have attended workshops are three times more likely to graduate than those who do not. Workshops give children and teenager somehow to express themselves, if they do not have the support to do so at home. Also, it gets them to think creatively and inventively, and expanding their views and ways of thinking. Educating children with and without a migrant background is beneficial, since they learn more about other cultures, religions and lifestyles. Most importantly, it also helps fight discrimination and promotes awareness. Additionally, it is beneficial for children with migrant background to integrate fully into the society.

Due to the migration wave and the current refugee crisis in Europe, more cultural and educational programs are need to support the newcomers coming to Finland. However, also more workshops, dialogues and discussions are needed to educate Finnish citizens on the different lifestyles of the migrants and refugees. By enabling constructive communication between those two entities successful integration can be guaranteed.

PS: If a company or a person has caught your attention, click on their names and their LinkedIn profile or web-page will pop-up! 🙂

Management Events

What are the challenges to work in an international work environment? Additionally, what are the benefits to work with people from all over the world? What is it like to work in a professional field, such as international business? Those were the questions that I asked myself, since I will start my internship in an international company called Management Events in Helsinki. Thus, to get answers to my questions and learn more about this field and the working environment, I decided to interview my future employer Wouter Goedkoop.

Wouter Goedkoop is currently a Dutch team leader delegate operations service center and project manager for Management Events. At first, Wouter studied Hospitality Management in the Netherlands and later came to Helsinki 4 years ago for private as well as educational reasons. Currently, he works for Management Events, where he started off as an intern and continued after his internship, which he described as a fun learning experience, hard-work but also rewarding. During the internship as a research intern for the Dutch market Wouter learned a lot about customer services, events management, communication and gained cultural knowledge. Wouter did not only want to develop himself as a person, but by working in a highly international work environment he also gained a lot of cultural knowledge and people’s skills. For the future, he wishes to continue to develop himself as a person rather than develop his career. Also, he wishes to return to his initial field hospitality and dreams of having a small restaurant somewhere warmer like Australia.

Wouter described the work life in Management Events as “Americanized”, it is very social, where everybody talks to each other. However, it is also very target driven and fast paced. Working with diverse people is fun, he developed a lot of cultural knowledge and he joked that German and Finns are similar in a way. However, he also faced some cultural difficulties by working with Philippines, where the work ethics are different compared to the Western ethics.

Management Events started around 25 years ago as a convention service office with the former CEO Olli Muurainen. Later, the events started to be more invitations based only. Through the growth of the company more tasks and division have developed, and also the company expended in Finland, then Nordic countries, Europe and then also Singapore. It still plans on expending globally such as Japan and Dubai.

The interview with Wouter was definitely fun and engaging, and I am really looking forward to the coming internship! 🙂