Student involvement

As part of the third year Arts and Festivals Management BA (Hons) degree, students have the opportunity to partake in an Event and Festivals Management module.  It is these students that participate in the running of the Cultural Exchanges festival, De Montfort University’s unique student-run festival!

Approximately 10 students are picked after a rigorous interview process, to put together three teams:

• Operations
• Administration
• Marketing

They take on all aspects of the set-up and running of the week long event. In the early stages their tasks range from:

• Putting together the programme
• Overseeing health and safety and technical requirements
• Organising hospitality for guests
• Designing and distributing promotional material
• Preparing press releases and conducting interviews.

During the event, the teams are expected to:

• Look after hospitality for guests
• Co-ordinate stewards
• Conduct interviews
• Generally ensure that the festival runs as smoothly as possible. 

This is a demanding, but very rewarding and exciting module to participate in, and endeavours to give you the experience of working in a real-life situation where team work must be implemented.

Cultural Exchanges is a fun, rewarding, and exciting festival to be involved in! Every year the festival gets bigger and better, and consequently the demand for valuable volunteers is even greater. Volunteers are needed to act as ambassadors in crucial areas such as marketing, promotion and stewarding.

There are many reasons why students should get involved in Cultural Exchanges! All volunteers will:

• Gain worthwhile experience in the marketing, promotion, and implementation of a successful festival
• Get hands on experience of stewarding at Cultural Exchanges events, and will get a full health and safety briefing from fully qualified staff.
• Have this worthwhile experience to add to their CV.