On February 4, 2014 we celebrated the 20-year anniversary of our foundation at the Impact Hub in Zurich. Over 100 persons attended this ceremony making it a huge success. We were particularly pleased that many of our donors were personally present at our event.
Without any doubt, the absolute highlight of the event was the presence of three of our scholars from three different countries. These were the winners of a video competition that we conducted in which numerous scholars of our foundation participated. The winners had qualified to be personally invited to our aniversary.
All competing short videos that were sent to us tell a "live time" story of individual scholars and alumni, and, the review of these left a deep impression on us. You can imagine that to select the best three videos was no easy task at all!
The prize for the winners - two young women from Colombia and Perú and one young man from Guatemala - was a trip to Switzerland. Here we visited selected places (Zurich, Laax, Berne, Lucerne, Geneva and St. Gallen), various institutions (e.g. the University of St. Gallen, the CERN, the Swiss Parliament) and in this way we were able to present to them our country and its values. The participation at our 20-year anniversary was the final "highlight" of this visit. The members of the Foundation Board took over all costs associated with this visit.
One of our biggest surprises was that on the occasion of our event another two of our alumni were also present. These were currently in Switzerland as part of their post-graduation education One of them is currently at the EPFL, Lausanne, doing his post-doctorate (see „Success Stories of Colombia“), and the other is currently working as a research assistant at the EMPA, the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Material Science and Technology. Another alumni, who currently works as a research assistant at the CERN, the worldwide renowned center for nuclear research, in Meyrin, was not able to attend our celebration. All three alumni are impressive examples of the enormous potential that each and every one of our scholars and alumni have.
For an additional report and interviews with former scholarship holders published by the news site Punto Latino please click here.
