On January 30, the “IEEE Branch Officers/ Volunteers Training Workshop 2013” was held in Karlskrona, Sweden to teach new branch officers and volunteers about IEEE activities. This event was jointly organized by the IEEE Sweden GOLD AG and the Blekinge Institute of Technology (BTH) IEEE Student Branch. All IEEE members and graduate students from BTH were welcome to participate in the event.

The workshop was led by Amir Zahoor, with Zoraze Ali and Muhammad Asif (GOLD members) co-facilitating the sessions. In attendance were 17 participants from different departments of the university. In the first session, an icebreaker was followed by an orientation on IEEE organizational structure at the section and regional levels. There were group activities to measure participants’ understanding and engage in team building. The second session covered event planning, volunteering, event management, fundraising, roles & responsibilities of branch officers, branch reporting and membership development. We believe all the participants were challenged and are now equipped to do better work as volunteers with IEEE.

Within Sweden the IEEE Sweden GOLD AG, WIE, and SAC have been locally organized into one committee named GWSAC, which has resulted in successful close collaboration on activities between the organizations. This is demonstrated by the fact that GWSAC has dramatically raised the number of IEEE activities held in Sweden over the last two years. We are grateful for the support of the Sweden section and trust that it will continue to foster IEEE GOLD, WIE, and student activities in the coming years.

Article contributed by Amir Zahoor, IEEE Sweden GOLD AG Chair