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How do you organize exams with hundreds of students in one room if you are required to maintain a distance of one and a half meters? For a long time, it was the ultimate exam question that no one could answer. But look: with a bit of creativity, we transformed Ghent’s Flanders Expo into the largest examination hall in our country. We spoke from a safe distance with the venue manager Katrien Verhoeven.
It is not the first time that Flanders Expo has helped during this corona crisis. At the beginning, the event location offered itself as a possible triage center, but fortunately, that never turned out to be necessary. For Ghent Port (Gent Zeehaven), Katrien’s team looked into whether it could store containers that remained on shore longer. And at Easter, the already ordered chocolate for the employees was donated to the nearby Maria Middelares Hospital.
And then came that request from UGent and Hogeschool Gent.
107,000 exams
In recent weeks, it was perhaps the most discussed topic in education: what about the exams? Auditoriums are large, but not *that* large. How do you ensure that every student can still take their exams in June?
With eight event halls and an empty event calendar, Flanders Expo proved to be the savior in need. “Until the end of June, we are organizing about 107,000 exams here,” says Katrien Verhoeven. “We do this in different shifts and in five different halls. And soon, in Antwerp Expo and Namur Expo, we will also welcome thousands of students – and even candidate police officers – for their final exams.”
We are convinced that we can also apply the same safety measures at trade fairs.
8 kilometers of barriers
There are few students who consider the exam period as an event, but production-wise it comes very close. “We have placed a total of about eight kilometers of crowd barriers. With these, we literally guide the daily influx of students in the right direction. The signage and communication plan has also been adapted to ensure that every student ends up at the correct disinfected table.”
To ensure all that traffic runs smoothly, Flanders Expo converted Hall 1 – one of the largest halls in our country – into a so-called crowd control room. Here, all students gather at a safe distance from each other, and staff from the college and university direct everyone to the correct hall.
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From 1 to 11 entrances
Letting thousands of students enter through one entrance is not a good idea in corona times. “That is why we subdivided our second largest space (Hall 8) into eleven zones, each with a separate entrance.”
Normally, mega-productions take place in this hall because of an impressive sound wall. But with thousands of students racking their brains, it will be very quiet there in the coming weeks.
Good news also for those who kept a bit too much distance from a passing grade: in August and September, even the resit exams will take place at Flanders Expo. “But if everyone studies well, we hopefully won’t need all five halls again,” laughs Katrien Verhoeven.
Waiting for the green light
Organizing exams is one thing, but what about trade fairs later where everyone likes to follow their own route? “We are convinced that we can apply the same strict safety measures at trade fairs. If we follow the mandatory four square meters per person, we are allowed to receive 13,500 visitors at the entire Flanders Expo site. That is quite something.”
Furthermore, Flanders Expo has already adapted its spaces everywhere: among other things, there will be a system that constantly monitors the number of people present, and everyone must have their temperature measured at the entrance.
So now it is just a matter of waiting for the green light from the National Security Council. “We hope to have concrete news on June 8. Then the first events can take place again from September onwards. Because of course, you also need some time to promote those events and get them operational,” concludes COO Alain D’Haese.
We are pleased that, thanks to the organization of the exams, we can gradually reopen the doors of Flanders Expo, Antwerp Expo, and Namur Expo.
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