Live from the MCAA Annual Conference (Sunday, March 7th)
Welcome to 3rd and last day of our Annual Conference! You can catch up on Friday’s jam-packed schedule here, and the Saturday one here.
Follow along with today’s updates right here on our live blog and on Twitter following the hashtag #MCAAConf2021.
*** This live blog was updated on March 7th during the Conference by the Communications Workgroup, you can find their bios and the end of this post. It has been edited on March 10 for clarity and consistency. Sessions appear in reverse chronological order***
Sunday, March 7 Overview:
- Closing remarks
- Parallel Sessions:
Capacity building for next generation Science Diplomats
Integrating inclusivity into research planning & communication
Workshop on Sustainable Research Careers
Closing remarks
Mostafa Moonir Shawrav, chair of the MCAA, opened the closing session of this conference, and thank everyone for the organisation of this conference.
After this brief introduction, Karen Stroobants, Fernanda Bajanca, and Mostafa himself highlighted the main key messages that came out from the Parallel sessions that took place in the morning, and that you can now read below in this blog.
Mostafa continued the closing event highlighting the most important moments of the conference, and thanking again all the panelists, and the session organisers.
He then shared a message from Valentina Ferro, vice-chair of the MCAA, who reflected on the meaning of being a Marie Curie Alumni, and on how much every single member is important within this association.
The screen then moved to Maja Mise, who continued by thanking all the members who were part of the Task Force, and that made this conference comes true: members of the Croatian Chapters, people supporting the subtitling, the communication working group, panelists, and of course all the persons who supported the MCAA in creating this conference and supporting (and solving) all the technical problems.
The conference ended with a final message from Fernanda, who thanked again the participants, and reminded everyone that the next week there will be the MCAA General Assembly (https://www.mariecuriealumni.eu/2021-mcaa-general-assembly) — feel free to join!
The Conference is now over, and we want to THANK YOU for having followed us on our channels.
However, stay tuned, because in the next weeks more reporting from the annual conference will be available on this blog!
Parallel Session: Capacity building for next generation Science Diplomats
This session was organized by Mostafa Moonir Shawrav, Chair of the Marie Curie Alumni Association since 2020, who asked the panelists questions concerning science diplomacy.
Question 1: How can we build trust between scientists and diplomats, so that they work together and ultimately convince policymakers?
Sir Peter Gluckman, chair of the International Network of Government Science Advice and President-elect of the International Science Council, answered by highlighting there is a separate culture of science, diplomacy, and policy. Therefore, it is important to develop a scientific and diplomatic language and to know when diplomacy can be assisted by science. Scientists need to listen to diplomats, provide unbiased answers, and bring the knowledge that is required.
Dr. Frances Colón, former Deputy Science and Technology Adviser to the Secretary of State at the U.S. State Department, started by saying scientists need to put their ego aside. Scientists should make themselves available and should learn how to speak different languages (diplomatic, economic, geopolitics, etc.) to interact with diverse groups. The pandemic is the perfect example, where scientists, diplomats, and stakeholders need to speak the same language.
Christina Bürgi Dellsperge, who holds a Ph.D. in History from the University of Zürich, explained that there are different levels between politicians, scientists, and diplomats, but all of them need to work for the benefit of the general public. It is important to have scientists in meetings when important decisions are made.
Question 2: What role will scientists and diplomats play to tackle the next big challenge?
According to Dr. Frances Colón, it is important to create networks that strengthen multilateral structures, bring effective discussions, and move forward together. We should be proactive by training people, systems, and institutions to quickly respond to the next biological emergencies.
Question 3: What is necessary to make the transition from science to diplomacy?
Sir Peter Gluckman answered saying “You need to be able to create bridges and bring people from different fields to solve transdisciplinary problems.”
According to Christina Bürgi Dellsperger, several aspects are required, such as general knowledge, curiosity, interest in politics, international focus, and be very sociable; diplomacy is learning on the job.
Dr. Frances Colón answered the question by saying it’s vital to not deviate from core values, and remember that it is an honor and a big responsibility. Do not forget that you represent your community. Think broadly and ask yourself: Where can I bring science diplomacy? Remember, scientific talents are needed everywhere, even in the most unusual scenarios. We can create spaces to collaborate with many other stakeholders.
Sir Peter Gluckman chimed in again saying it is your role to tell what we know/don’t know and what the available options, and in that way help in the process of decision-making.
Question 4: What are the basic skills that science diplomats need?
According to Christina Bürgi Dellsperger, you need to love human interactions, be sociable, curious, open-minded, and speak more than one language. If you love something, simply just go for it! If you don´t get it, don´t worry too much because something else will fulfill you. Enjoy what you do!
Dr. Frances Colón views his as public service, a responsibility to civic engagement. A science diplomat is able to identify opportunities when/where science can help and be flexible, create opportunities, step into spaces that are not the first choice for everybody, set the ego aside, and be part of a team.
Sir Peter Gluckman concluded that science diplomates should receive the proper training, work with different people, be honest, trustworthy, and understand the role that you take; read science, policy, economy, and other topics which are not your expertise; and create a network of people who think and live like you.
Parallel Session: Integrating inclusivity into research planning & communication
Dr. Shannon Chance kicked off the session by welcoming everyone and then inviting all speakers to introduce themselves. Dr. Madga Theodoridou, Chair of the GEDI group at MCAA, gave an introductory note on what the GEDI group focusses on, which is a broader inclusivity than gender alone, and also gave a glimpse of the myriad of events that GEDI has organized recently — both online and in-person. She was joined by Dr. Nadia Metoui, Vice-Chair of GEDI, echoing the same sentiments. Dr. Jovana Mihajlovic Trbovc, joining in from Slovenia, and Dr. Caroline Sheedy, joining in from Dublin, were the expert speakers for the session, who each briefly introduced themselves.
The first topic of the session was an insightful talk from Dr. Mihajlovic Trbovc on the toolkit they’ve developed for integrating gender-sensitive approaches into research and teaching. He pointed out that:
- there is no magic formula for gender-sensitivity, rather it is a pair of glasses that you put on while looking at your research;
- ender-sensitive results helps make results more relevant for society;
- if you are gender-sensitive, you are much more likely to be sensitive to other differences as well, such as race and class.
The toolkit Dr. Mihajlovic Trbovc put together has 2 key sections, in addition to the introductory part: (1) Gender in academic teams, and (2) Introducing gender content. The toolkit invites researchers to go through a 3-step process, guided by asking a series of critical and triggering questions, in order to evaluate how gender-sensitive their research is and where they can improve.
Next, the audience was divided into 3 breakout rooms for an interactive activity based on the toolkit. Each group was provided with a few pages of the toolkit, and was asked to reflect on how those sections apply to their work, and how they would implement it in their recent projects.
After the breakout session, the next expert speaker Dr. Caroline Sheedy presented her compelling work on gender equality in academia and research (GEAR), where the focus is on examining why certain groups have more or less access, opportunity, and success in STEM fields. The development of the GEAR tool came about after Dr. Sheedy flipped the question to ask where women leave tech (rather than why), and where men get tech (rather than why).
The GEAR tool has four phases: Define — Plan — Act — Check
Dr. Sheedy ended her presentation with an inciting observation, that in her experience, the students are very open and willing to engage, and change.
To round up, Dr. Mihajlovic Trbovc gave a recap of the reflections from the breakout session:
- People find the use of toolkit important, but not always relevant to their specific fields;
- It is important to bring in female speakers to classrooms, so there is inclusivity and visibility for the students from the early stage of their learning and career development;
- Importantly, language plays a huge role — use neutral language, but be wary of treating male-centred language as the neutral.
The session ended with Dr. Theodoridou thanking the panelists, noting there is the need for further conversations on this topic, and also by sharing the upcoming GEDI events, and with a note of thanks from Dr. Chance to the participants and speakers for joining this initiative to help bring gender-sensitivity to research and academia.
Parallel Session: Workshop on Sustainable Research Careers
Dr. Gábor Kismihók, started the session by introducing himself: he is Head of the Learning and Skills Analytics research Group at the Leibniz Information Center for Science and Technology (TIB) in Hannover, Germany; and Chair of the Career Development Working Group at the Marie Curie Alumni Association as well as chair of the recently started COST Action on Researcher Mental Health. Then, he went through the activities that will be carried out throughout the workshop, keeping in mind that “how can research careers be sustainable?” will be the main question of the workshop.
He then pursued in describing the major point of the Declaration of Sustainable Researcher Careers:
1. Provide Sustainable career prospects for researchers;
2. Deploy career management services at organisation employing researchers;
3. Put more emphasis on transferable skills training and recognition;
4. Provide wide variety of networking options and services in and outside academia;
After this brief introduction, a workshop took place, during which participants were split into four Breakout rooms covering four different topics:
- Breakout 1 → Career development, facilitated by Fernanda Bayanca, vice-chair of the MCAA, she is active on Science Policy and she has contributed to the “Declaration on Sustainable Researcher Careers” and “Towards Responsible Research Career Assessment.” The topic of this room is how can we as researchers contributes to improve our careers perspective and how can supervisors and our institution can support us?
- Breakout 2 → Institutional career support, facilitated by Matthias Girod, Secretary-General of Euroscience since 2019. Here, the topic was what can be done to better support the career of a researcher and which are the practices that should be implemented?
- Breakout 3 → Transferable skills training, facilitated by Dr. Gábor Kismihók, focusing on the topic of which the most important aspects are that we should consider both at the institutions and researchers’ levels, and what should be implemented?
- Breakout 4 → Networking, facilitated by Dr. Fran Cardells, a Big Data Analytics senior expert, affiliated to the World Economic Forum, the Association for Computing Machinery and trusted by the Global Fortune 500. In addition, Fran speaks to executive audiences at global industry events (Big Data Innovation Conference, Mobile Growth Summit, InsurTech Insights). Beyond work, Fran champions diversity and inclusion working with non-for-profits. The topic in breakout 4 is how can we improve networking and how can we better connect to the job market?
Two very interesting and vivid round of discussions took place and all the ideas that came up from this meeting are stored at this link (fully available for the next couple of days): https://padlet.com/kismihok/SRC
The session ended with a brief overview of the results of the various breakout rooms and a general discussion took place.
Meet the live-blog team:
- Valerie Bentivegna is a Science and Medical Writer, produces Geeky Comedy Shows in Seattle, and is Chair of the Communication Working Group of the Marie Curie Alumni Association.
[personal blog, Twitter] - Ruben Riosa is an animal nutritionist currently working as a PhD student at the University of Bonn/University of Glasgow, where he is part of the MSCA ITN project MANNA. His project focuses on dairy cow’s nutrition and physiology. In the MANNA network, he is also the Scientific copywriter. He is deeply interested in science communication.
[LinkedIn, Twitter, personal website] - Fatemeh Asgari completed her PhD in life sciences as part of ESR ITN project in 2020 at Humanitas Research Hospital, Italy. Currently, she is doing a postdoc in San Raffaele Hospital. She is interested in science communication in the form of science writing and illustration.
[LinkedIn, Twitter] - Arturo Castro Nava is about to complete his Ph.D. in Chemistry at the DWI-Leibniz Institute for Interactive Materials in Aachen, Germany. He was part of the MSCA ITN “BIOGEL”, where he developed a light-modulated hydrogel to investigate how cells respond and behave in a dynamic microenvironment. He is passionate about science, volunteering work, and complementary/alternative medicine.
[LinkedIn] - Dr. Celia Arroyo-López has worked in the development of “green” strategies against gastrointestinal parasites in livestock. Later, she tested the biomedical applications of parasitic products as a therapy for autism.
After years of labor abuses, she authored petition No 1132/2020 on the creation of a specific EU organ to prevent harassment in academia. Read about her work on stopbullyingresearch.wordpress.com.
[LinkedIn, Twitter] - Utkarsh Singh completed his PhD from the Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee in 2018. He has worked as a Postdoc in the OPERA-Wireless Communications Group at Université libre de Bruxelles; and also in the AI Lab at Vrije Universiteit Brussel. Currently, he is working in Depsys SA (Switzerland) as a Marie-Curie Individual Fellow. His research interests include artificial intelligence, signal processing, and smart grid.
[LinkedIn, Twitter] - Ashish Avasthi is a Marie-Curie early-stage researcher (MSCA-COFUND) doing his PhD at Bionand in Malaga, Spain. His research is currently focused on molecular targeting of glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) for early diagnosis and treatment using surface-functionalized nanoparticles. He likes to distribute his time between his varied interests of science, sports as well as writing.
[LinkedIn, Twitter]
