With all live events having been postponed or cancelled, there has been a surge of online activities including virtual events worldwide. The same goes for the students at Taylor’s University as they not only studied online, but hosted a virtual event like no other. The 1st Asia Pacific Virtual Events Conference 2020 (AVEC) co-organised by Taylor’s University and the Asia Pacific Institute for Events Management (APIEM) was an international virtual research conference that aimed to bring together researchers, education providers, students, scholars, and professionals in the Events industry from all over the world.
What started as a simple project for their curriculum for the second year students from the Bachelor of International Tourism Management (Honours) (Events Management) programme, known as the Revive team, slowly became one of the largest events hosted by the school this year. The students are required to fulfill the requirement of a group project component under one of their modules which is Event Operations. Over the course of 3 months, the students worked tirelessly to design and organise the conference to be held on Zoom on the 25th of November. Many meetings and rehearsals were held and even though there were setbacks such as the implementation of the CMCO halfway through the semester, the students pushed through and were more determined than ever to organise the first event of its kind well. Hence, almost 100% of the event planning is working from home.
The 1st Asia Pacific Virtual Events Conference, held on the 25th of November, lasted from 1pm to 6pm via Zoom web conferencing. It was hosted by two members of the organising committee themselves, Mr. Adrian Isandro and Ms. Phibe Tan, and the conference began with the welcome speeches by Professor David Hind, the President of APIEM, and Dr. Joaquim Dias Soiero, the Head of School of Hospitality, Tourism, and Events. The conference featured five keynote speakers: Dr. Rob Harris from Australia, Ms. Dee Dee Quah from Malaysia, Dr. Elena Vassilieva from Russia, Dr. Hsinwen Chang from Taiwan, and Dr. Rob Davidson from the United Kingdom who all gave insightful speeches relating to the topic - “It’s now time to think to the future!” This was followed by 10 researchers from multiple institutions locally and internationally that were able to present their contemporary findings from their research papers.
The event was registered by almost 1100 delegates from over 19 countries such as Philippines, Sri Lanka, Latvia, Malaysia, Taiwan, and many more and almost 40 companies or institutions. It got many praises and compliments from parties all over the world, making it a highly achieving event. Organised in conjunction with the Asia Pacific Institute of Events Management and advised by Professor David and Ms. Khairiah Ismail, the students from Taylor’s University, was met with a challenging task but successfully organised the 1st Asia Pacific Virtual Events Conference 2020. The event can be watched again at any time via Revive 2020’s Facebook page.