How were your first few weeks as a new Vice Rector?
Very exciting. You get to meet so many new people and have to make so many decisions that you hadn’t necessarily seen coming at all. I used to think my diary was full before, but now it’s full to bursting. Something I noticed first up was how many highly skilled people there are working in the divisions. I meet so many fantastic people in the administration who are so unbelievably dedicated and really give their all for the University—it’s genuinely impressive.
What surprised you most when you moved to within University management?
How different the various Vice Rectors are. As everyone knows, we hold these positions on a voluntary basis on top of our main jobs, because we truly believe in the University and in the mission and vision of our Rector. It’s something we all have in common. But I was surprised by how differently the Vice Rectors organize themselves, how different they are in character and how much discussion goes on among them about what needs to be done along what lines, where things could be improved, and so on. There’s always an awful lot to talk about and an awful lot of time that’s put into making decisions.
What do you want to achieve as Vice Rector for Research?
First, promoting early-career researchers is very important to me. I’d say we’re already in an excellent position in this regard, thanks to the Argelander Program, for instance. But there’s also scope for us to do it even better. We need a larger number of structured graduate programs and want to make sure that most of our doctoral students are on them. Second, we want to create long-term career prospects—from the time someone begins their career at the University of Bonn to when they move to a senior position—so that we can retain our best minds too.
What’s the Argelander Program about?
It’s a supporting program for doctoral students and young members of group management that offers mentoring, HR development and continual professional development, contributes to travel expenses for conferences and provides grants for research projects. I’d like to expand the program even further, developing it more toward a holistic understanding of science, or polymathy as it used to be called. So that aspects such as philosophy, ethics, perhaps also culture, politics and religion are incorporated too. This is because we’ll not only need people who are strong in their specialist field but also those who have an eye on the big picture if we’re to answer the questions we’ll be faced with in the future.
You yourself are continuing your research in neurophysiology and genetics; you’re now a member of the Rectorate and are also academic lead of NeurotechEU—the European University of Brain and Technology—in Bonn. Why is it important for the University of Bonn to be a member of this network?
NeurotechEU brings together several European universities. It’s partly a scientific alliance that unites the very best minds in order to find out how we can translate our fundamental understanding of the neurosciences into actual technologies. But it also exists to answer the question of how we can train the next generation. And I really mean from the very start, from fresh-faced first-semester students to working people seeking opportunities for continual professional development. We have a common job market in the EU, but we should also have a common training and apprenticeship market—not just in terms of training placements and apprenticeships at companies but also in higher education. But there’s still a huge number of obstacles there that we in the university alliance want to eliminate.
It’s really impressive how many balls you’re juggling at the same time. Where do you get the energy? What motivates you?
Somehow I’ve always had a lot of energy. It helps if you’re the kind of person who can never sit still. And who’s curious to boot. I’ve simply always wanted to know things. Deep down, I’m an idealist. I believe in this University, in my research objectives, in everything I’ve described. That’s what drives me.