“When I applied to TAMK, I took the Pre-Task very seriously. I planned it for numerous amount of days and talked with my friends and family on how I should execute it and what their thoughts on the overall product was. Their opinions were more valuable than gold, and even though I got some harsh feedback (“Why are you using green as a colour and not red” or “That font looks stupid”), it gave a whole new perspective to what I was actually doing.

Sometimes you can get stuck to a certain idea, and might think it is great, but remember to ask around! This way you can get new opinions, fresh point of views and a different approach to the whole execution. If something isn’t working, move on and try it differently.

I remember submitting the Pre-Task and feeling that I have sincerely done all I could. I was proud of what I had achieved and knew deep down that I would get an invitation to the entrance exam. If you feel the same way, you’ll get it too!”

-Noora, Interactive Media student since 2011

When applying, remember to include these documents in the application process:

More information and details on how to get the appropriate certificates and language skill proofs can be found here.

Find the Pre-Tasks from here:

Interactive Media
Music Production
Fine Arts

Apply through www.studyinfo.fi 7.1.-27.1.2015!

The Pre-Task is the first step in your application and the most challenging one. Also for us the Pre-Task has been really, really exciting! But there is no need to panic if you don’t have an awesome idea right away!
Some of our students will provide you here with some useful tips and tricks for the Pre-Task.

Remember when you applied for TAMK! How did you get prepared for the application?

“I prepared for the application by relaxing and consuming culture from different sources. Opening your mind in whatever way works best for you is, in my opinion, really the best way to prepare, since the task of applying is going to ask for both effort and creativity.”
– Markku, Interactive Media student since 2012

“I started preparing for the task a lot of time in advance, because I wanted to make the Pre-Task perfect. I got inspired by different webpages, movies, books, comics, whatever, and then brought all that inspiration together for an amazing results (at least in my opinion hehe). They key is to be in the right mindset and staying focused.”
– Noora, Interactive Media student since 2011

Which tips could you give new applicants while they are working on the pre-task?

“I have grasped that interesting ideas are more important that technical skills. Enthusiasm is also a plus, they are looking for people who are interested in learning new and improving their skills.”
- Krista, Interactive Media Student since 2012

“Make sure you've understood the task correctly, then try your best to do a decent job!”
- Lukas, Interactive Media Student since 2011

The pre-tasks mostly also include a portfolio! What would you suggest to applicants to put in the portfolio?

“Create the portfolio from works that you 1. enjoyed making 2. are proud of 3. got good feedback from others”

– Markku, Interactive Media student since 2012

Friday 21st November

Morning sessions with keynote speakers and workshops.

Learning new in empowerment workshops

Students listening to Mathias Haas from Supersocial. (Photo by: Ida Tokola)

Ida To: Many of us took part in Social Media Marketing workshop in the afternoon. It was held by Mathias Haas from Supersocial, who has worked as marketing consultant for many large companies like Red Bull. Our afternoon session flew by very quickly and we were amazed by his knowledge of every social media channel.

Haas for example told us how the Facebook algorithms work, which was very eye-opening since Facebook doesn’t really give out this information on their web page. We learned that if you want everyone to see your Facebook posts, the best thing to do is to post statuses with different formats (photo/link/text) and try to awake responsive conversations in the comments. 

Felipe: Just complementing what Ida said about Haas workshop. Other key point for sharing posts on Facebook is the timing. He said that only 8% of your “followers” will receive your posts, so one way to be sure that your posts will succeed is to schedule one-two hours before the time that you wanna share your post, because it takes that long to Facebook actually publish it in their timelines.

Confusion in the Student Exhibitions

Ida To: Before traveling to Graz, all of us were grouped with other European students to evaluate the EYA projects. We worked on these projects many weeks via Yammer, which was an online tool pretty similar to Facebook and Google Docs. Most of us had some problems with this task since EYA didn’t provide us with very clear instructions. We tried to manage and most of us ended up giving some feedback for our projects and designed posters for the Student Exhibition, which was going to take place during the awards.

So, in the afternoon of Friday 21st, we headed to Graz University of Technology to present our posters and student projects. There we were told to present our feedback and posters to an audience, who were to decide which student project had the best ideas. Some of us were happy to meet other fellow team members from all around Europe, when others noticed they were the only ones to present their team. Despite these confusing matters we were trying to have fun in the exhibition. We met a lot of people from Austria and other European countries, which was very nice.

Ida Tu: In addition to the international teams we had all worked in, there were surprise teams built from Austrian students of the Graz University of Technology so every project was supposed to have two posters - one made in Graz by local students, and one made by international teams and carried from elsewhere to the festival. This was the place where I met the team behind the project I evaluated (with Sami and other international students) which was GovFaces - with Sami we both felt they had a good if somewhat idealistic grasp of their project and we gave a lot of feedback as we discussed their project in a generally really great mood. Why I wanted to bring this up is explained a bit further down!

Felipe and Tarina excited to see who has won this year’s European Youth Award (Photo by Ida Tokola)

The Evening Gala

Tarina: The evening gala was the thing we had all been waiting for. It was the ceremony for presenting and rewarding the overall winner of the European Youth Award, along with the other winning projects. The award ceremony took a while but it was worth the wait, after that it was time for, again, networking, buffet food of local goods, alcoholic beverages and dancing!

The party was held inside the mountain, in a space called Dom im Berg. The evening was hosted by Adam Montandon (the first ever EYA winner) and I have to say, he did very well of course, he’s been hosting the EYA parties for quite a while now.  

Felipe: Don’t forget to say that WE start the dancing!

Ida Tu: The winner of the European Youth Award 2014 festival was the project GovFaces I mentioned earlier, and while it naturally wasn’t perfect or complete I had to be proud of the guys working on it! They were real sweethearts and deserved to win, and I think both me and Sami managed to congratulate them in person when the award ceremony was over. They thanked us, the feedback team, also on stage which I have to admit was really heartwarming, because we all saw quite a lot work on evaluating these projects beforehand and giving thoughtful and constructive feedback.

The EYA winners! (Photo by Tarina Tommiska.)

Following blog post summarizes the day two, 20th of November, at European Youth Award festival in Graz.

Web of Needs, Vision Hunting and Innovation Camp Defining trends for web of needs for Healthy Life | Smart Learning | Connecting Cultures | Go Green | Active Citizenship | Money Matters | Future Living | by Christina Maria Busch, Florian Kleedorfer and other members of Research Studio
Chrystal: The morning workshop which was conducted by the Research Studio (?) was split into three major parts: A presentation to introduce “Web of Needs” is about A collaborative session with all the participants by choosing 3 out of the 8 categories of own interest and discuss possible topics which concerns the “Web of Needs”. Followed by another round of discussion of the top 5 most voted topics from the second part. Overall, I find that it assuring that people from different backgrounds and countries in all over Europe (and other parts of the world) seemed to have similar ideas on what our future looks like and how technology would help to shape that future. Chrystal, Ida Tuominen, Petra, Helmi, Alessandra, Felipe and other students brainstorming in the workshop. (Photo by Ida Tokola) Helmi: After hearing about the web of needs we swiftly moved on to the vision hunting which was an interesting experience to say the least. We would gather in groups and discuss different kinds of topics relating to EX. smart learning, connecting cultures, active citizenship and future living. This session was a bit confusing to me and it was really hard to get your voice heard through dozens of other loud voices. A lot of good ideas were created during that session though! It was really inspiring to see how people from other cultures and countries viewed these topics and what kinds of great ideas they had in store. I went to the workshop/discussion group about future living and modern nomads, as did almost every single one of us. I found the idea of modern nomads to be nicely topical and interesting in many ways. We worked with the idea with a “roadmap” that Ida drew very skillfully and neatly. The group was a bit slow to start up so the workshop host had to nudge us to the right direction with visual exercises where we stuck pictures to the roadmap to present possible problems and success criteria.  I really enjoyed this workshop even though I wish I would have participated more. It’s a bit too easy for me to just take the spectator’s role when other people are working. I still learned a lot by just watching listening to other people share their ideas and visions. We completed the workshop with a canvas full of different kinds of outlooks on modern nomads so I could go ahead and say that the session was a success! Petra: Most of us TAMK students ended up choosing the same discussion group, the one with modern nomads. In MindTrek there was already some talk about these nomads, who are able to work wherever they want via internet so the basic idea was familiar to most of us. Together we created a road map in which we added succession factors, core goal, secondary goals and challenges. One method we used was adding random pictures cut out of magazines to our road map and describe if it was a challenge, goal or succession factor. Some of the pictures were bit hard to add to our road map but with some wild imagination they all found their places. There were couple of non-TAMK students in our group too and I was bit sad that they didn’t take too much part in the discussion - but I can’t blame them. It was easy for us to work together as we all knew each other and all had some experience of this kind of brainstorming. Our group leader didn’t have to guide us almost at all, we were working so hard already after we got an idea what this group discussion was about. Alessandra: Definitely no surprise when I arrived to the room with my red number-five paper to see that most of our classmates were sitting there, waiting to learn something that they can use when working as a modern nomad, living abroad. I know that my future lies with different project all around the globe, which is why I was rather pumped to know more about this lifestyle. We started to make a mindmap (that Ida so niftily illustrated), what are the first things to take care of before moving, possible obstacles, things to prepare and do when arriving and finding contacts. It was rather helpful afternoon and I did enjoy the fact that so many of us are interested in living abroad, working online and so-on. Ida Tuominen presented the ideas to make the lives of modern nomads easier. Photo by Sami Lindfors/Felipe Santana. Ida Tu: I was really pumped about the topic most of us TAMK students had chosen - the modern (online) nomads - so I wanted to contribute to the best of my ability. I volunteered to draw and write out are ideas on the “roadmap” we created, honestly really inspired by the brainstorming everyone was committed to, and threw ideas back and forth with the other participants in the workshop. After we gathered to meet up with all the different teams we kicked off a fishbowl session where one representative from each team had to sit in the middle of the room as they were interviewed about their team’s results while other 50+ people took the role of an audience and sat around the interviewees in a circle, hence “the fishbowl”. None of our team was exactly wishing to be the first one picked - I think even our international students have the Finnish mentality of not wanting to be in the spotlight in a stressing situation - and my earlier volunteering landed me in the middle of the room as our workshop leader pointed at me and offered “that tall one there” when Peter Bruck, the host, wanted to know which person is going to represent the modern nomad team. I have to admit it was an extremely stressing situation, but at least later on I was assured it went well and I represented both our team and TAMK in an adequate manner. I was asked consent of having one quote of my speech in an Austrian online magazine Mokant, so there had to be something that was expressed in an inspiring way (at least I can hope so!) Rolands: Group discussion - connecting cultures During the workshop we had to come up with an idea/road/map or whatever how to connect project to its consumers. While everyone was randomly shouting their ideas without purpose I stayed quiet, made notes, simply absorbed floating information and gathered ideas. I arrived to get inspiration from people, projects, presentations but when Joseph (“Trash Out”) saw me making notes, I got into the spotlight, I had nowhere to run so I had to present my ideas. In the end instead of getting inspired I was the one who was inspiring. This lesson I learned has invaluable cost. Everyone has something to give. Notes I made during the workshop.
AFTERNOON SESSION: THE BEST IN DIGITAL CREATIVITY FOR SOCIAL GOOD EYA Winners introduce their innovative digital projects to the audience Alessandra: Later in the evening we headed to the Graz University of Technology. During this evening event, the host went through ALL of the projects, giving the teams a chance to pitch their projects to the audience. With their given time limit of 10 minutes, I was rather surprised that so many professionals there exceeded the pitch time-limit and the host had to cut off. The whole thing took all-in-all almost 4 hours so it was a little bit overwhelming considering the fact that we had only two 15 minute breaks. There of course, were some projects that caught my attention with the way they were presented such as SlidesLive (archive of presentation) from Czech Republic. The speaker ended their pitch in a grandiloquent manner with a metaphor and then literally set a garbage can on fire! love it.

 A Portfolio Review took place for the third year Fine Art students. The review was a part of the Professionals Studies II and English Language courses. 

In the review, there were three reviewers: MinnaSuoniemi from Aalto University, Kalle Turakka Purhonen from GalleryHuuto and Juha Suonpää from TAMK. 

After 20 minutes one-on-one reviewing, the reviewers made a portfolio walk and chose the best presentation and decided who will get the prize. But don´t tell this to the third year students, because they don´t yet know that somebody's getting a prize!

Text and image: Antti Haapio 2014

Edits: Carita Forsgren

On top of Graz! (Rolands Tiss. Photo by Felipe Santana.)

This is the story of TAMK Media students' trip to European Youth Award festival in Graz, Austria. Following blog posts take place in 18th–22nd of November. The trip was part of Networked Media Culture course.

According to EYA's own description, the festival is "a pan-European contest to motivate young people to produce socially-valuable digital projects that address the goals defined by the Council of Europe and Europe 2020. It demonstrates their potential to create innovative solutions with Internet and Mobile technology. The EYA Festival is an established platform for international knowledge-exchange and a widely recognized networking-event for future cooperation. EYA is organized by the International Center for New Media, a Non-Profit Organization based in Salzburg, Austria." (http://eu-youthaward.org/)

Team 13 Media! (Sami Lindfors, Sohvi Sirkesalo, Ida Tokola, Tarina Tommiska, Chrystal Giam, Felipe Santana, Rolands Tiss, Alessandra Bernard, Ida Tuominen, Helmi Pirinen, Petra Mether.)

Up in the Air!

Sami: Everyone was able to wake up in time for the morning flight from Helsinki–Vantaa Airport to Vienna. Most of us consumed a lot of coffee since we had to be at the airport already on 6am!

Though most of us were in Austria for the first time, we still saw some familiar faces around. We found out that our fellow 13 Media music student Kalle Boissonnier is a famous advertisement face in the country!

See? (Selfie by Kalle Boissonnier.)

We really enjoyed the train trip from Vienna to Graz. The route went straight by the mountains and – as a Finn from the flat part of Finland – I was amazed about the view and the fact people actually build cities on slopes we’d call the most dangerous slopes ever.

We were really excited and prepared for the views! (Alessandra Bernard, Felipe Santana, Chrystal Giam. Photo by Sami Lindfors.)

The view from the window was amazing throughout the 2 and a half hours we spent on the train. (Photo by Sami Lindfors.)

Well, on the very first train we took from Vienna Airport to the City, we witnessed how local junkies snorted cocaine right next to us. It was before 12 AM.

The A&O Hostel was a pleasant surprise. The rooms were really nice, with own separate toilets and showers, and the bar downstairs was quite nice. Also the breakfast was good considering the price. (Author doesn’t receive any credits from the company for this endorsement, though he would be glad to negotiate about it in the future.)

Amazing view on top of Schlossberg!

Before the actual festivities, we visited FH Joanneum, a university of applied sciences in Graz. Their curricula are similar to TAMK Media’s, but with the exception that they have a hornet on their yard.

Team 13 Media again! Could we have a hornet to Mediapolis' backyard too? (Sami Lindfors, Sohvi Sirkesalo, Ida Tokola, Tarina Tommiska, Chrystal Giam, Felipe Santana, Rolands Tiss, Alessandra Bernard, Ida Tuominen, Helmi Pirinen, Petra Mether.)

There were some cool and provocative Putin posters on FH Joanneum’s walls. (Photo by Ida Tokola.)

After the visit we decided to go blow our minds. We climbed on top of Schlossberg to see the entire city of Graz!

Of course we had to take some selfies there! If you're on Instagram, you can find a lot of our photos with hashtags #Graz #EYA2014 #13Media. (Photo by Sami Lindfors.)

Witness the infinity! (Photo by Felipe Santana.)

Welcome Session | Speed-Hello-Working

Speed-Networking - Meet Europe's most innovative social Start-Ups, creative students & ICT experts

Videomundus – Produce your personal video about your EYA-motion

Chrystal: This is where we had our first official welcome by the organizers. We formed into two circles, one circle inside the other and paired up with somebody we didn’t know. The 2-minute speed introduction then began with getting to know each other’s name, profession, interests, and other things. When time is up, the inner circle rotates clockwise and again, we paired up with a new face and the process repeats itself every 2 minutes.

Through this speed-introduction, we got to know other participants of EYA (winners, students, lecturers, etc.) from different countries in Europe. Personally, I find it rather amusing and enlightening at the same time that some immediately launched into a speed-marketing speech promoting their projects while others asked questions like “What motivates you?”, “What is your passion?”. I’ve learnt that it is important to tell concise details about yourself and be interested in what others do.

Welcome party

Tarina: The thing that motivates us students the best is anything that involves food and alcoholic beverages. The organizers of the EYA were kind enough to invite us to the first welcome party that was held in the Graz town house. It was after the beginning session with warm welcome words by the city officials (like the mayor’s representatives) when Paul Hughes held his Ten Meters of Thinking presentation. Afterwards we arrived to the cabinet with a food buffet and a selection of non-alcoholic and alcoholic beverages! We had some time to network as well. Instead of networking right away, our corner table decided to direct some Instagram movies. Plenty of fun, indeed!

An example by Sami, Ida and Tarina: how wine should be consumed by a proper media student. Rolands didn’t appreciate wine at all. (Photo by Felipe Santana.)

Ten Meters of Thinking

Designing the path of individual & organizational transformation by Paul Hughes

Chrystal: Paul Hughes is a master at mnemonic storytelling and it is quite a pleasure to attend his talk for the second time, albeit a different topic – about how to think and act differently as an individual and as an organization to design the future. From his talk, I learnt that instead of managing people, we can achieve so much more by facilitating and collaborating with others. He reminded us to always ask “Why?” and while we use our hands and head to design, it also has to come from the heart.

Paul Hughes drawing a Circle of Hearts during his Ten Meters of Thinking presentation. (Photo by Sami Lindfors.)

Stay tuned for the blog posts covering the two other days of EYA 2014!

Are videogames your passion? Without music you couldn’t live anymore? Do you love to paint every single moment of your life? Are you creative and want to study? Then TAMK is the perfect choice for you!

For the moment these are the most important dates you should keep in mind for your application: