The first conference of 2021 for the International Business Studies Exchange Network (IBSEN) was held on May 20-21. Due to the covid pandemic, the event was hosted virtually again, by Valenciennes with the help of Indian River State College for the virtual platform. 29 people attended virtually.

On day one of the conference, after the welcome words, each participant gave information about recent developments in their universities. There were a few specific presentations. Jessica Dinstel (UPHF) presented the european project Peer-IR-View, where Ibsen is an expert advisor. Bernard Wach (Bielefeld University of Applied Sciences) presented “Ibsen Entrepreneurship Workshop in February 2021 – Results and Collaboration”. Then there was a discussion about the new Ibsen agreement document, which needs to be signed by all members. At last, there was a plenary discussion on Ibsen current working topics : internationalization@home, summer schools, international internships, staff and student exchanges.

On day two of the conference, Önder Filiz (Izmir University) presented “Conquer the market by marcade: an online marketing simulation for undergraduate / postgraduate students”. Then all Ibsen members went to breakout rooms to carry on exchanging ideas on Ibsen current working topics. After the break, all groups explained what they had come up to, and participants could ask questions and propose a few ideas. There were quite a lot of proposals about Internships (virtual internships, hybrid internships) and how each university could contribute for the sake of all Ibsen members. The consensus was that each group would carry on working together on their subject until next Ibsen meeting in order to make a practical proposal which should be “test-able” by the whole group.

President Alessandro Spano expressed everybody’s whishes that even if these online meeting are highly productive, next meeting could possibly be hosted physically again by a university.

Next Ibsen Meeting should take place at IRSC, on November 15-16.