Our Nordic pillar receives invaluable support from national committees and selection contacts in all Nordic countries and autonomous regions.
To ensure that this mutually beneficial cooperation is kept up, we have created and signed, an MOU (Memorandum of Understanding). In the picture, Claus Reistrup, the Faroes and Thomas Urvas, Åland, with Rektor Richard Lamont and Council Chair Pär Stenbäck.
For the second consecutive year, our student-initiated Investment Club has reached the finals of the prestigious investment competition for high school students facilitated by Wharton School of Business of the University of Pennsylvania. The club aim at finding viable alternatives to the current profit-driven investing culture. “It is our belief that returns on investments without impact are, in a sense, mere numbers, whereas returns with visible impact are something of much greater magnitude: change.”
The competition consists of a 3-month trading period. Fifteen out of the approx. one thousand registered teams are selected to take part in the finale. Both years, the RCN Investment Club has generated higher returns than the S&P 500, despite their ethical and sustainable approach.
Herman (Sweden) and Jesper (Denmark), who initiated the club last year, have kept it up in their second year. Again, they qualified as one of the fifteen finalists. As this is during the IB exam period, only the first years will be able to go: Anton (Sweden), Arran (Canada), Ossian (Finland) and Kieren (Malaysia). Good luck to the team and thanks to Jesper, Herman, Kasper (Norway) and Elias (Norway) who were central in getting the team to the final.
In the photograph – from left to right: Herman (Sweden), Jesper (Denmark), Arran (Canada), Anton (Sweden), Ossian (Finland), Kieren (Malaysia), Elias (Norway) and Kasper (Norway)
The first week of May in 2018 is Coastal Protection Week all over Norway when local communities clean the coast from plastic and other pollution. In Fjaler the clean-up happened a bit earlier and, just like last year, RCN joined in.
Despite the bad forecast, the weather was gracious, and we managed to clean the long shoreline of Dale and the scenic Fossevika on the opposite side of the fjord. We found objects like bags, boxes and toys, but most of the trash was coming from fishing and sailing, like ropes and lines. It made an impression to see how much trash can pollute the water and coast, even in an area where you think that people are conscious about the issues. The work was followed up with a barbecue where our students and staff had the chance to bond with the others who took part in this “dugnad” clean up.
The College’s signpost – first planted on the grass between the Admin and Andresen Buildings in 2003 with arrows pointing to cities across the world – has over the years taken on a real significance at RCN as both a visual reminder to us all of the world beyond and also destinations our graduates head towards. Photographed with snow on it and caught in summer sunshine, we use it again and again to illuminate what the College stands for; it sits proudly in both our Strategy 2020 and our formal agreement with the Norwegian Red Cross.
Over the years, the weather has taken its toll on it.
This spring – Jelena (a teacher from the founding generation), Alf Magne (Head of Maintenance) and a team of students – Freddy (Cameroon) and MJ (Thailand) – set about restoring and redesigning it with some help from Nynke and Olivier (The Netherlands) and the Bio Lab team.
New locations of outstanding natural beauty and significance were selected across the home planet Earth for our directional arrows. In addition, the team added a lower set of arrows to our UWC sister schools and colleges across the world and the distance in kms from the signpost.
It was reinstalled and unveiled on Friday 27th April by the design team, with an introduction by Jelena, in front of first year students, interested staff members, members of the RCN Council and other guests.
Thank you to all those who, over the years have contributed to the original design and repair work – with special mention to our former Head of Maintenance, Vidar Jensen.
It was a very special occasion and we are delighted to introduce you to our new signpost.
