FAQ

BEST, Board of European Students of Technology is a constantly growing non-profit and non-political student organisation. Since 1989 we provide communication, co-operation and exchange possibilities for students all over Europe.

The main activities of BEST are: BEST courses, Engineering competitions, Career days, Education related events.

Once you become a member of BEST you have the chance to travel in new places around Europe, get to know students from other universities, develop your soft-skills (such as presentation skills, leadership etc), organise an event. Also, being a member it means that you should attend our meetings, help in our events and ofcourse have fun! You can apply here.

The organising Local BEST Group (LBG) is trying to get as much money as possibly by co-operating with several organisations. The university is interested in hosting foreign students and in becoming more internationally minded. Companies wish to get access to European-minded students, which is done during the event by company presentations, guest lectures or company visits. In some countries, the student union also provides some financial aid.

The fee depends mainly on the situation in the Local BEST Group, how much support they get from university, student union, etc.

As the economic situation differs in the European countries the maximum allowed fee also differs. The maximum fee is 4 Euro per day (but no more than 45 Euro) for students from Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden.
Students from Germany, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Slovenia and Spain pay 2/3 of the fee.
It's 1/3 of the fee for students from Czech Republic, Croatia, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Slovakia.
Students from Bulgaria, Macedonia FYR, Romania, Serbia & Montenegro, Turkey, Ukraine and Russia pay no fee.

As said above LBGs fund the events by support from various organisations, like the university, companies and the student union. Most of these organisations are interested in an academical course. Therefore, raising money for leisure events is much more difficult. Moreover these events are more like a holiday and they include some activities like sailing, skiing or wine-tasting - usually you pay more for a holiday like this ...

The organising LBG gets all the applications entered by the students and then will decide on regional aspects (they try to get people from all over Europe, so they in general won't take more than one student from each city/country), on your Motivation Letter (they have to read many of them, so try to be creative!), and maybe on your educational background (only if you need some previous knowledge for a specific course). The organisers also aim at having equal number of male and female participants.

Yes, and no... Yes meaning you can apply for every course, no meaning it might not be reasonable in some cases. It is possible that one course requires some previous knowledge and if you don't have that you might not be taken. On the other hand, there might be beginner's level courses in the field of your study and then the course will get too boring!

You can apply for maximum three BEST Courses or Engineering Competitions and three other (education, leisure) events per season. You can be accepted to at most one BEST Course or Engineering Competition per season (but any number of other events).

After the final examination you will get a BEST Certificate to attest your participation and to describe the content of the course. The BEST Certificate has the University stamp and teacher's signature. It is up to your home University if they will get this course recognised by giving you credits.