From October 29 to November 15, students took part in the inaugural BIP titled Mastering the Art of Effective Presentations event designed to sharpen their presentation skills. It began with four online workshops focusing on key topics: The Path to a Successful Presentation, Intercultural Communication and Presentation Skills, Mastering Verbal and Non-Verbal Communication, Crafting Visually Engaging Presentations. The online sessions were followed by an intensive in-person program from November 11 to 15 in the university library, where students participated in hands-on workshops to polish their presentation styles. The event culminated in live presentations before an expert jury, with prizes awarded to the top performers. Simultaneously, on November 13–14, the well-established International Student Seminar unfolded at SU SBA. Both events were organized by our School of Business Administration, the Portuguese Polytechnic Institute of Bragança and the Polish Politechnika Rzeszowska, Faculty of Management. A total of 38 students participated: 10 Czech and 5 international students from SU SBA, 14 from Portugal, and 9 from Poland.

Both events are all about student presentations. Both aim to prepare students for presenting in the best possible way and also give them the opportunity to test their newly acquired knowledge and skills in presenting, compare their performance with others and get feedback from the expert jury. Each participant had exactly 10 minutes. These can seem like an eternity or a fleeting moment - depending on how prepared you are for your presentation. And what was the talk this year? Topics such as ecology, marketing and artificial intelligence resonated the most, but there was also no shortage of original student projects or the results of thesis and seminar papers. It's like a talent competition where, instead of singing and dancing, it's whether you can sell your idea to others. And believe me, our students do it with such vigour that Steve Jobs would applaud them!

Both events traditionally end with a "Closing Ceremony" during which the best students are awarded. They receive, in addition to a scholarship of CZK 2,000 for participation, prizes worth 10 000 CZK. The jury had a difficult decision this year again, as there were many excellent presentations. Some impressed us with their style, others with their scientific approach to solving the problem, and some with the perfect interplay of the presenting team. However, some of the presentations had everything that was needed, plus something extra that allowed them to make it into the top five. First place went to Portuguese student Ricardo Gonçalves with his presentation "A.I.'s Energy Consumption". Second place went to our Czech student Magdaléna Ostárková with her presentation "Why is presenting so scary?", which also won the student prize, an award voted by the students themselves. Third place went to Portuguese students Beatriz Nery and Mariana Lima Cachada with their presentation "The Importance of Design". Fourth place went to the Polish duo Lidia Salamon and Szymon Cisło with their presentation "Negative influence of social media on young adults". And the fifth place went to our Indian student Fawas Sherief with his presentation "Challenges in Multigenerational Teams". With sincere pleasure we congratulate all the awarded students - you are masters of the art of presentation! A huge thank you also to everyone who participated, whether as competitors, judges or organisers from all three universities. We look forward to seeing you again at a future event. Bring your A-game again, and we’ll be ready to cheer you on!