Presentation of the 2019 Golden Globes

The annual VHL University of Applied Sciences (VHL) Golden Globes were presented on the staff day on Tuesday 9 April 2019. VHL presents the globes to give recognition to special projects by students. Two jury prizes and an audience prize were awarded during this edition. This year, the jury members were Peter van Dongen (Chairman of the Executive Board), Maarten Pennewaard (education journalist at Leeuwarder Courant) and Saskia van Gend (programme manager within the Applied Research Centre 'Food & Dairy').

Winners

During this edition, 12 student projects competed for the prizes and they were all winners, course. The jury and the audience were therefore faced with a difficult choice. 

First prize - jury: building a greener Velp
Students Roel Spanjers, Jens de Goede and Jonathan van Ekris (Land and Water Management) were commissioned by the municipality of Rheden to develop a method to map out petrification of private gardens. This serves to identify the districts with the highest degree of petrification. Using this information, the Municipality of Rheden will start work on operatie Steenbreek (‘operation stone-breaker’).

Second prize - jury: chemical recycling of PET
Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) is a widely used packaging material. Because contaminated PET cannot be recycled mechanically, there is growing interest in the chemical recycling of PET. Student Gerbrich Kaastra (Chemistry) is researching various methods used in this recycling process.

Audience prize: Chasing Coral
The project came about as an initiative of students Steven van der Stelt, Charelle Holleman, Joelle Spronk, Anne Baauw, Mirthe Knaap and Francis Danen (Coastal and Marine Management) after watching the documentary Chasing Coral. This documentary compellingly highlights the problems with coral and their consequences. The project aims to show young people that this problem exists, also in the Netherlands Antilles. This is why an interactive workshop was developed for students in the final years of senior general secondary and pre-university education. To ensure that the workshop fits in with the students’ world and the requirements of the biology teachers, consultations have been held with the Lecturer Development Team. The students will shortly give the first workshops.

LC Awards 2019: wild card for ‘The White Engine’

Winners of the Golden Globes basically move on to the LC Awards, an initiative by Leeuwarder Courant. However, the focus here is on student projects within the province of Friesland – and therefore the winner of the first prize ('building a greener Velp') is not eligible, unfortunately. However ... This is good news for another project that could fill this place, based on the highest jury score applicable in this case.

Wild card at the LC Awards: ‘the white engine’
Studenten Iris van der Gun, Lynette De Vries, Géline Andringa and Antsje Veldstra (Agribusiness and Business Administration) have created a product for their learning enterprise which they have to market themselves. They created an informative reading book about milk, the cow and much more. The book is intended for readers from the age of eight. With this book, they hope to shine a positive light on dairy farming and they want to teach children who live in the city more about how milk is made. No less than 100 books have been sold in two weeks’ time.

We congratulate the winners and wish them lots of success at the LC Awards!