Grenoble Ecole de Management (GEM) stretches the boundaries of technology to provide an immersive and human experience for its new students. The transition to a fully ecological and zero waste school continues to be at the heart of all our initiatives. From a virtual live Welcome Forum, to virtual tours of campuses, one to one or group meetings, interactive activities, presentations and much more.
1. A Welcome Forum for its 8000 students from September 9th to 22nd
This is a first for GEM: a single collective start to the new school year for its 8,000 undergraduate, continuing education, postgraduate, international and local students. We have fully recreated our campuses online using immersive virtual technology to provide our new students with the opportunity to discover our campuses, services, associations, meet other students, book one-to-one meetings, and to have the most immersive and human experience possible. Each new student can take themselves through our virtual fair, take part in interactive activities on the stands, go on campus tours and discover all the student services GEM has to offer: financial aid, disability support, medical and psychological online consultations, sexual harassment prevention, coaching, careers development, associations, the alumni network and more. The entire forum is accessible in both English and French.
2. A CSR Challenge for its new students
The 'Acts for Sustainability' challenge launched at GEM on September 7th strives to encourage new students to proactively and promptly act in favor of the ecological transition. Those who decide to take part in the challenge will have to carry out a tangible initiative in response to one of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). They will then have to figure out how to get their counterparts at GEM and outside of GEM to buy into the initiative. Through this, we hope to introduce our new students to the ecological, economic and social challenges we are facing in our transition to an ecological school, and one of our 5 core engagements. The students that participate in this challenge will also be invited to sign the GEM Manifesto for a Sustainable Future (an E-Book presenting GEM's new CSR standards) and to participate in a Sulitest session (an online platform dedicated to raising awareness
3. A back-to-school challenge on a virtual campus from September 10 to 24
This year, the new students at GEM will discover the campuses in France through virtual tours that will also allow them to interact with the GEM teams involved in the back-to-school challenge, to meet and talk to people from their school, through their customized avatars they will create when signing up for the tour. New students will need to discover the theme of back-to-school challenge using clues scattered around the campus. They will then have 10 days combining courses and virtual workshops to learn how to use the art of controversy to propose a "new deal". The new deal will concern one of the 6 societal and environmental issues defined during the health crisis and will be easy to leverage in the Grenoble ecosystem. The results will be shared in an exhibition that will take place on September 24th with 144 virtual stands in which students will pitch their "new deal" projects in front of a panel of professionals, visitors. 6 representatives from key corporate partners.
4. Campus Virtual Tours
Since September 7th, GEM has made virtual tours of all its campuses in France (Grenoble headquarters, GEM Labs and Paris) available to all of its new students wherever they are located. Each new student visiting our campuses is greeted by Loïck Roche, the Dean and Director of GEM, in the main entrance, and can then go on to have a stroll in the gardens of the Paris campus, and to visit the innovative GEM Labs campus.
5. Career events throughout the school year
GEM's career services are enhancing their services offering by providing more career opportunities, meetings with businesses, job search webinars, one to one coaching sessions, weekly Q&A's, career chats, CV flash workshops and thematic weeks by sector. GEM is intent on providing its students and graduates with the best support they can in this crisis to help them find a job, an internship or a work-study program. Since the beginning of the Covid-19 crisis, no less than 19 career events have been organized and one-to-one appointments scheduled with all those that have requested one. The Annual Business Recruitment Forum will take place on January 20 & 21 of 2021, in person if the health conditions allow.
