Buddies’ Sharing Session with IOSBC and PICO PENS

Buddies’ Sharing Session with IOSBC and PICO PENS. On Saturday (5/12) International Office Student Buddy Club (IOSBC) of Telkom University in collaboration with PENS International Cooperation Office (PICO PENS) of Electro Polytechnic State Surabaya held a Buddies’ Sharing Session. This activity was attended by more than 50 participants consisting of IOSBC and PICO PENS student buddies.

In this activity, the representatives from each university discussed about the history, jobdesc and also their annual activities. IOSBC is a student organization under the auspices of the International Office Telkom University, which consists of active Telkom University students who are responsible for assisting foreign students studying at Telkom University. Not much different from IOSBC, PICO PENS is also an organization under the auspices of the International Office of Electro Polytechnic State Surabaya.

IOSBC is divided into two units, including the hospitality unit which regulates the role of buddy in handling and assisting the foreign students and the media unit that plays a role in publication activities. Unlike the case of IOSBC, PICO PEN itself has three units which are divided into conference, hospitality and media units.

This sharing session is an opportunity to exchange ideas and share information among students buddy where they can get mutual input to handle the foreign students. This activity began with an explanation of each organization and was continued with a question and answer session and games. Each student buddy shared their experiences with the foreign students and the programs they participated in together with foreign students. A slightly different activity can be seen from the activities carried out by PICO PENS where they can be involved in international conferences held by the campus. Meanwhile, interesting activities that IOSBC can also participate in are non-academic activities such as outbound activities with foreign students.

There are many benefits that can be obtained by every student joining as student buddies at each university, including getting international exposure and improving their foreign language communication skills. Moreover, they can also expand their social networks with the students from various countries. It is expected that this event will become an annual event that will be carried out by the International Office Student Buddy Club (IOBC) in collaboration with other student buddy organizations in Indonesia and abroad.(IO)***