A school day for 87 eleventh-graders, and how it got there
As an sdw scholar I led the school outreach for our regional group's social day. On July 1 it happened.
On Wednesday our social day took place, 8:15 to 14:45 at a comprehensive school in Potsdam. Eleventh grade, three classes, 87 students. The topic was resilience and self-efficacy, under the title “Zukunftsmut”, courage for the future. Run by scholars of the sdw (German Business Foundation), free for the school.
Some background. Since October 2025 I’ve been a scholar of the sdw’s Klaus Murmann fellowship. I applied in March 2025, and in January the welcome event in Berlin had a workshop on privilege and responsibility. In my first semester report I called that semester a kind of stress test: 42 instead of 30 ECTS credits, Red Cross, our collective and, at the end, my first job. My grades didn’t get worse. Since this summer semester I’m the PR officer of our regional group in Potsdam.
Which is how I ended up running school outreach for our social day. In May the group picked the topic. I sorted a list of 22 Potsdam schools by priority, wrote a short strategy paper on whom to contact at a school and when, and wrote to six schools individually, plus the career guidance service of the employment agency. In the end, one school said yes. The contact came through a recommendation from the career guidance people, not through my emails to the schools.
Then the part that didn’t go to plan. In June I was ill and away at the same time with the HPI Engine startup tour in Amsterdam. I handed part of the communication to the group and kept the rest myself. What counts is the outcome: the day happened, with all three classes.
What stays with me: 22 schools on the list, one yes, and it came through a warm contact. I’ve seen the same pattern somewhere else this summer.