The ECTS Academy has be founded as a daughter society of the ECTS. The concept follows the model of interdisciplinary Young Academies: young researchers self-organise their society to foster personal contact and networking among the most talented young scientists. With the aim to promote scientific excellence through fostering collaborations and mentoring young scientists, the ECTS Academy organizes several activities targeted to new investigators within the ECTS society and during the annual meeting. The chairs of the academy are also represented in the ECTS board. Recently elected as new co-chair of the academy, Annegreet Veldhuis-Vlug is now to take the next turn.
Annegreet practices as an internist-endocrinologist at the Jan van Goyen Medical Center / OLVG Hospital in Amsterdam, the Netherlands where she coordinates the osteoporosis clinic and the fracture liaison service in addition to her general endocrine outpatient clinic. In addition to her clinical work, she conducts translational research on the role and endocrine regulation of bone marrow adiposity in relation to bone disease and energy metabolism affiliated to the Center for Bone Quality of the Leiden University Medical Center in the Netherlands and the Center for Clinical and Translational Research of the Maine Medical Center Research Institute in the USA. As chair of the ECTS Academy and ECTS Board Member, she will promote the enthusiastic and collaborative atmosphere within the ECTS to enhance scientific and clinical collaboration between members from all backgrounds and career level.
The ECTS Academy is dedicated to support young researchers in their career path and offers different formats of mentoring for New Investigators, including undergraduates, PhD students and early stage post-docs. We have now introduced a new virtual mentoring format, the Mentoring Chat. This online format provides guidance for young researchers and is an excellent networking opportunity even in times where we are all highly effected by the Corona pandemic. Informal discussions of specific topics with members of the ECTS Academy are organized several times a year as videoconferences.
The first Mentoring Chat took place at 6th of July and covered the topic “Negative results and rejected paper – no reason for frustration”. The videoconference was chaired by Petar Milovanovic (Belgrade, Serbia) and Marietta Herrmann (Wuerzburg, Germany) and was attended by 7 New Investigators from all over Europe who discussed their experience with members of the ECTS Academy.
The new Mentoring Chat complements our well established mentoring options:
The Mentoring Session is an integral part of the annual ECTS conference. This is an interactive session giving the New Investigators an opportunity to discuss various topics with the leaders in the field, ranging from specific scientific topics to career advice.
The Mentor Scheme is a unique opportunity for ECTS New Investigator members to be matched with an experienced professional to gain career advice, support and guidance. This scheme is a development technique based on the use of one-to-one meetings to enhance an individual’s skills, knowledge and performance. Content of the meetings remain strictly confidential between mentee and mentor.
For more information check out our webpage.
The next Mentoring Chat chaired by Liesbeth Winter (Leiden, Netherlands) and Alex Ireland (Manchester, UK) will be entitled “Fantastic money from small grants: How to get this” and help the New Investigators to identify suitable grant opportunities as well as discuss the challenges of the application process. The event will take place at 12th October at 6 PM (CET). Don`t miss the chance and register now here.