My CIVICA Experience by LSE CIVICA Ambassador Koshiki Chauhan

My CIVICA Experience

When I first started at LSE, I was excited by the international environment and keen to find opportunities that would allow me to travel abroad, meet students from various countries and learn from different cultures. The CIVICA Engage Track was advertised in a student newsletter, and once I applied, this triggered my broader involvement in the CIVICA network which became a constant throughout my 4 years at university, and led me to becoming a CIVICA Ambassador in my final year.

My first event with CIVICA was the Student Association Forum in 2023 held at SGH Warsaw School of Economics. Here, I represented LSE’s International Relations Society and met students from different associations across Europe. The aim of the conference was to bring students with similar interests together, so they could later form groups and apply for the Student Engagement Fund (SEF): a mini-grant that funds projects across CIVICA universities and facilitates cross-country collaboration. I met some amazing students in Warsaw and we stayed in touch, but it wasn’t until a year later when I was on my CIVICA exchange at the Stockholm School of Economics (SSE) in Sweden when I reconnected with a student and we then formed a team and applied to the SEF.

The SEF funded our idea to create an EU Negotiation Game with the aim of increasing awareness of EU decision-making and addressing low voter turnout amongst Europeans. This project was a collaboration between LSE, SSE and the Hertie School, and we held workshops in Stockholm and Berlin which involved students assuming the role of an EU country and trying to reach a consensus around different topics, including the green transition and migration policy. Alongside this project on my exchange year, I also took specific courses to fulfil my Engage Track requirements and completed my showcase assignment which focused on integration policy in the UK and Sweden.

When I returned to LSE for my final year, I wanted to encourage others to take advantage of the same CIVICA opportunities I had gained so much from, and becoming an ambassador was a fantastic way to do so. As an ambassador I was able to travel back to Warsaw to meet other ambassadors from partner universities. Here, we got to know one another, workshopped different ideas for our group project, and there was the opportunity to form teams to apply for the SEF. Over the year, I was involved in making short form content for CIVICA’s social media, advertising CIVICA network events within the LSE community, and contributing to our group project which was a series of videos to demystify CIVICA activities and make them clearer and more accessible for students at all partner universities.

Through CIVICA, I have gained friends all over Europe who I remain in contact with and who are all passionate about a variety of social causes. The network has made me realise the importance of youth engagement and finding shared goals that we can support each other with in a world which is becoming increasingly polarised. My favourite aspects of CIVICA and being an ambassador have been the incredible people, and the opportunities to travel to universities across Europe and see and learn from different styles of research, teaching and collaboration. I would encourage any student who wants to make an impact within their community and gain international exposure to apply to be the next ambassador for their university.

Thinking about becoming a CIVICA Ambassador and representing your university? Now is your chance, check out how to apply through your CIVICA university.