ESN Zadar
ESN Zadar was founded only two months after the establishment of the first Croatian section, ESN Zagreb, in November 2011. From that day on, the number of the members varied. Currently, we count 20 members and around 100 Erasmus students every semester. In the academic year 2013/2014, we got our official office space, which makes our work considerably easier. We work closely with the International Office of the University of Zadar, Student Council of University in Zadar, association CINAZ, and Info Center for Youth who promote extracurricular activities for local students and youth in Zadar.
In the academic year 2021/2022, the section has around 20 volunteers and the Local Board of ESN Zadar is made of:
Leon Sić as President;
Sanja Tolić as Vice-President;
Ante Njegovan as Communication Manager;
Dajana Zrnić as Treasurer.
The first thing that comes to mind when mentioning Erasmus+ is multiculturalism and diversity. That is exactly the spirit we want to share, and with that in mind, we organise a series of international dinners. This way we presented Croatia and its culture, and along the way tested the level of knowledge of our Erasmus students through fun games and quizzes.
We participate in the implementation of almost all ESN International projects. We have SocialErasmus activities including volunteering in a dog shelter, kindergarten, Erasmus in Schools, and Red Cross. We got recognition from our National Board for organising the best SocialErasmus week in the winter semester of 2015. We also have ExchangeAbility events including visits and workshops in blind association and sign-language workshops and videos for which we got a Star of the Week, recognition from our National Board for the most creative promotion of the ExchangeAbility project. We were on national television talking about the project and we got a movieSTAR award at Annual General Meeting Germany 2017. We had few Mov’in Europe events in collaboration with our University, city library, where we talked about student mobility almost every month and our students share their culture and stories from Erasmus, national events such as making of the #WhyErasmusPlus video, and campaigns on our Facebook page. In October, we organised activities for the Time to Move campaign from Eurodesk in collaboration with the organisation CINAZ where we promoted mobility with presentations. We got the National Board recognition for Best Cooperation with International Relations Office in 2018 and Best Evolution in 2019.
ESN Zadar organised the 8th and the 15th National Assembly of ESN Croatia.
Everything we do for Erasmus students we do for us as well. We use the time we need for organising events for team-building activities and we have lunch together pretty much every single day. We live in a really small city and not a day goes by that we don’t see each other on the streets. But the things we do just for us as ESN volunteers and team building are movie nights, trips, and most usually long coffee breaks, something Croats are known for. It really feels like we are on Erasmus with our international students and we make the best out of every situation.
