Helmholtz Juniors

The Helmholtz Juniors ( HeJu s for short ) are a doctoral initiative within the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centers (HGF), the largest non-university scientific organization in Germany. It was founded in May 2005. The Helmholtz Juniors represent the doctoral students from all Helmholtz research centers.

The goals are intensive networking among the doctoral students and a further improvement in doctoral training through constructive initiatives. It currently represents the interests of around 8,000 doctoral students (as of 2017). Within the German non-university research organizations, the doctoral students of the Max Planck Society ( PhDnet ) and the Leibniz Association also have doctoral initiatives (Leibniz PhD Network). These were founded in 2003 and 2016. Together with the PhDnet and the Leibniz PhD Network, the Helmholtz Juniors founded the N2 network in January 2017. It serves as an exchange between the three doctoral initiatives. Furthermore, it should serve to speak with one voice in political discussions that affect young scientists in Germany and to give them more weight.

composition

The Helmholtz Juniors are an annually changing team of two delegates from each Helmholtz Research Center, who either belong to the doctoral initiative at their location or were sent by it. If there is still no doctoral initiative, the respective management sends two doctoral students. All juniors are the contact persons for every doctoral student within the Helmholtz Association in order to bring their concerns into the discussions.

Foundation and important milestones

It was founded on May 5, 2005 at the inaugural meeting of the Helmholtz Juniors in Berlin. The initiative was officially presented by the initiators to the representatives of the member centers of the Helmholtz Association in the evening at a meeting of the German Parliamentary Society in the Reichstag Presidential Palace.

The initiative arose on a cross -center doctoral retreat of the Helmholtz Center for Infection Research (HZI), where doctoral students from the HZI, the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research Foundation (AWI) and the Helmholtz Center for Environmental Research (UFZ) were present. After an intensive discussion about the different conditions at the different locations, the initiators Torge Martin , Anna Barbara Heide (both AWI), Phillip Hahn , Nadia Zghoul , Varsha Gupte , Cornelia Hunke (all HZI), Ralf Wagner and Christine Reinemann (both UFZ ) a concept for a Helmholtz-wide doctoral initiative. They presented this to the President of the Helmholtz Association at the time, Walter Kröll , who supported this concept.

In order to continue the implementation of an annually planned helmholtz-wide doctoral conference (see doctoral conferences ), the Helmholtz Juniors received their own budget from the HGF from 2017. This necessitated a change in the statutes and the election of a treasurer to be responsible for the budget. At the HeJu annual meeting in 2016 these changes were decided and a treasurer was elected.

Annual meetings

A general conference of all Helmholtz Juniors is held annually in order to assess the progress of projects that have already started and to coordinate the procedure for the coming year. There is an official handover of the old Helmholtz Juniors to the new Helmholtz Juniors, new working groups are filled and the HeJu speakers are newly elected. It was decided to hold the annual conference at the beginning of the year at a location of the Helmholtz Association.

Previous annual meetings:

2005: Berlin (constituent conference)
2006: UFZ , Leipzig
2007: DKFZ , Heidelberg
2008: FZJ , Jülich
2009: HZI , Braunschweig
2010: HMGU , Munich
2011: DESY , Hamburg
2012: KIT , Karlsruhe
2013: HZG , Teltow
2014: HZDR , Dresden
2015: AWI , Bremerhaven
2016: DLR , Oberpfaffenhofen
2017: DKFZ , Heidelberg
2018: FZJ , Jülich
2019: GEOMAR Kiel
2020: HZDR Dresden

Since the summer of 2014, a half-yearly meeting has been held in the HGF office in Berlin. The half-year meeting is intended as a pure working meeting.

Speaker and Treasurer

The Helmholtz Juniors community elects two new representatives at each annual conference for the coming year. Any doctoral candidate present who is still a doctoral candidate for at least one year can be nominated for election. In the secret ballot, each center has two votes, which are usually cast separately by the two representatives of a location. The two candidates, who each receive more than a quarter of all votes cast, are elected as equal speakers.

A treasurer has been elected annually since the 2016 annual meeting.

Elected spokesperson for the Helmholtz Juniors:

2005: Ulrike Lemke ( DKFZ ) and Phillip Hahn ( HZI )
2006: Anna Kruschinski ( MDC ) and Simon Lang ( GSI )
2007: Anastasia Galkin ( GFZ ) and Jochen vom Brocke ( DKFZ )
2008: Tilman Janzen ( HMGU ) and John Kettler ( FZJ )
2009: Sebastian Aderhold ( DESY ) and Torsten Leitner ( HZB )
2010: Connie Walther ( AWI ) and Christoph Schlude ( DKFZ )
2011: Connie Walther ( AWI ) and Michael Fischer ( AWI )
2012: Marlene Bamberg ( DLR ) and Martin Seilmayer ( HZDR )
2013: Doaa Megahed ( MDC ) and Jaques Ehret ( HMGU )
2014: Nichloas Engel ( HZB ) and Sripriya Murthy ( HZI )
2015: Meike Köhler ( HMGU ) and Daniel Neumann ( HZG )
2016: Dagmara Rusiecka ( GEOMAR ) and Elias Eckert ( DKFZ )
2017: Giulia Caglio ( MDC ) and Konstantin Kuhne ( HZDR )
2018: Vasiliki Anastasopoulou ( MDC ) and Erich Zähringer ( DLR )
2019: Stephanie Taylor ( DZNE ) and Tim Lienig ( FZJ )
2020: Pengbo Sun ( DKFZ ) and Isabela Paredes Cisneros ( DKFZ )

Elected Treasurer of the Helmholtz Juniors:

2016: Konstantin Kuhne ( HZDR )
2017: Lara Grünig ( HZG )
2018: Lara Grünig ( HZG )
2019: Oguzhan Kaya ( DKFZ )

statute

At the 2007 annual meeting, statutes were adopted for the Helmholtz Juniors and expanded at the 2017 annual meeting. The values of the Helmholtz Juniors are (excerpt from the preamble):

Fairness to one another
Openness to new good ideas
reliability
equal rights

PhD conferences

In 2012, the Helmholtz Juniors organized a Helmholtz-wide doctoral conference for the first time. It was called "Helmholtz Networking Day" and was financed from excess funds from the Helmholtz Association. In the following year a new edition of the PhD Day was planned, but not carried out due to lack of funding. After discussions within the Helmholtz Juniors and discussions with the outgoing President of the Helmholtz Association Jürgen Mlynek and the new President Otmar Wiestler , a budget for the implementation of a Helmholtz doctoral event was requested in 2015 and approved the following year. After the founding of the N2 network, the N2Joint event was held in 2017 as a joint conference by Helmholtz Juniors, Max-Planck PhDnet and Leibniz PhDnetwork. In order to keep the burden on the voluntary members and helpers of the doctoral initiatives bearable, it was decided in 2018 to hold the N2 event only every two years, alternating with the "NextGen @ Helmholtz", which will then take place again in 2020.

List of Helmholtz doctoral conferences:

2012: "Helmholtz Networking Day", 13.-14. September in Berlin-Adlershof at the HZB and DLR
2016: "NextGen @ Helmholtz", 28. – 30. September in Braunschweig at the HZI
2017: "NextGen @ Helmholtz", 5. – 7. July in Kiel at GEOMAR
2018: "NextGen @ Helmholtz", 25. – 27. July in Potsdam at the GFZ
2020: "NextGen @ Helmholtz", TBD in Darmstadt at the GSI