As EPICUR was one of ten alliances organizing the event, Michael Zacherle (KIT), the Coordinator of EPICUR-Research, was formally representing EPICUR in the Organizing Committee and in the event itself. During the occasion, EPICUR provided a presentation, a moderator in a workshop, a panelist in a roundtable, a poster presenter and two of the seven rapporteurs of the forum.
“We were able to express our worries and needs, but even more so our chances and opportunities. Especially the representatives of the European Commission were clearly amazed by the astonishing results that all 17 alliances have achieved within less than three years already.” said Zacherle, summarizing the outcome of the forum. The alliances plan to continue their efforts to coordinate and to exchange best practices proven to be effective in the coming years.
Together with representatives of many of the alliances of the second and third generations, more than 40 alliances were present, at the same time with manifold stakeholders like the European Commission, the European Parliament and a number of national ministries and research funding agencies.
“As I just took over, the conference was a great opportunity to meet colleagues from EPICUR and also many different alliances to learn about what their alliances did so far within the Horizon program. It is clear, that the Alliances are here to stay and the best practices from the Horizon supported actions should be integrated and fostered further. It is crucial to find new sources of funding for researchers and research support within the alliances to make these actions sustainable. It was a pleasure to talk to many dear old and new colleagues and to follow interesting talks.” said Charlotte Langowski, Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg’s institutional coordinator for EPICUR.
Thras Tsiatsos (Associate Professor, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece and WP2 EPICUR Research Leader) has participated in both days of the “Science with and for Society in European Universities Alliances”.
Thras has co-delivered a speech with Anouk Tso (University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands and WP4 EPICUR-Research Leader) in Workshop 4 (Inter- and Trans-disciplinarity in research management Roles). Thras and Anouk have presented EPICommunity platform. EPICommunity (https://epicommunity.auth.gr/) is a fully interoperable platform with Europas and it is a place for Early Career Researchers to connect with peers, to showcase their work and to collaborate and create groups. The audience has expressed very positive comments about EPICommunity.
All in all the event was really successful and an opportunity for exchange ideas and to boost collaboration among alliances.
