Tuning up at YLES...
On 6 July 2017, the YLES for the first semester was held in the Lux Gym at Luxembourg Campus. YLES stands for Year-Long Educational Series, and as the name suggests the day was full of various presentations meant to educate the faculty and staff of the entire SGEN.
With the school year having begun for the College Division and the Basic Education standing a few steps away from their own starting line, it was no surprise that the presentations given were about what it meant to be a member of the SGEN community—and how, besides supporting the students, employees ought to support each other. In a school it’s easy to believe that the students are the top priority, and while they certainly rank high up on the list of components to think about, there are so many other things to keep in mind to keep the Institution together. There’re the drives that’re launched, forgotten in the background as they’re on-going until situations call for them; there’s the inspiration needed for an employee to keep working, unnoticed by most when all that’s seen are the fruits of that inspiration; there is the concept of nobility and honour in whatever profession one pursues, even when students (or their parents) might try to bring that down. So many other points were raised that day that it’s difficult to list them all down, but needless to say the already-sparkling qualities of each employee roaming the halls of SGEN’s schools were only polished to further glory in the talks that were held.
If there was one way to summarize the events of A.Y. 2017-2018’s first YLES, it’d probably have to be with the metaphorical image of each employee being a gear, a nut, a bolt, or other such mechanical parts. Parts are meant to work together to make a machine work, and in this case, that machine would be the SGEN “family.” They can only work so well together for a while before they need maintenance, though, and that’s where the YLES comes in: through inspirational talks, activities that boost the morales and senses of camaraderie among employees, and firm reminders of what SGEN stands for and tries to uphold, the parts of the machine are oiled and maintained to keep their whole running smoothly.
Having a determined and brilliant work force is only the first part of having a world class institution. SGEN shows us that the next is to make sure that work force stays that way.
