European Researchers’ Night

On the first weekend of October, Groningen celebrated the national Science Weekend. The weekend began on Friday 30 September with European Researchers’ Night, which was held in Forum Groningen and open to all researchers, students, and interested guests. This year, the theme was ‘Women & Science’. European Researchers’ Night was seamlessly followed by Zpannend Zernike, a free science festival for primary-school-aged children and their parents or guardians, held on Saturday 1 and Sunday 2 October. View the full programme and the participating locations!

European Researchers’ Night
On Friday 30 September, European Researchers’ Night has been organized across Europe to celebrate and question science. In Groningen, we have been celebrating the night in Forum Groningen between 7 and 11 p.m. with a talk show, music, quizzes, interactive exhibitions, and a drinks reception.

This year, the theme in Groningen was ‘Women & Science’. It was, after all, in our city that women made history in science, with Aletta Jacobs as the first female student and Jantina Tammes as the first female professor in the Netherlands. For years now, more women than men have been awarded PhDs at the UG, and the first female Rector Magnificus was recently appointed. Still, we are not there yet.

Women’s rights are under pressure, female professionals are still underrepresented in top positions, and women are far less likely than men to be research subjects, for instance in studies on how medicines work. At the same time, women’s perspectives are needed more than ever. We can only approach societal challenges like climate change, digitization, health, and a fair society effectively by using an inclusive and interdisciplinary lens.

How do we ensure an inclusive perspective on societal challenges? We have been trying to answer this question over the course of the evening through discussions, debates, interactive exhibitions, and much more as moderated by presenter Anna Gimbrère. The full program can be downloaded here.

Both Dutch and English were spoken during the programme.

European Researchers’ Night and Zpannend Zernike were partly financed by the European Commission under the Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation programme, grant agreement no. 1010 60416.

Below you find a few photos of this successful weekend, the European Researchers’ Night and Zpannend Zernike, made by Lucas Kemper.