Joëlle Fennebeumer

After completing secondary school, Joëlle Fennebeumer first started training as an English teacher at Windesheim University of Applied Sciences, but after three years, she chose to also follow her true interests, namely Religious Studies. She completed the Bachelor’s degree with an average mark of 8/10, while at the same time successfully completing the Windesheim programme. In addition to these two full-time Bachelor’s programmes, she was very active within the Gerardus van der Leeuw Faculty Association, where she chaired the Activities Committee and the Almanac Committee. From 2011 to 2012, she was President of Gerardus van der Leeuw, a position which she combined with serving as a secretary on the Faculty Council.

Joëlle is currently enrolled in a Research Master’s programme, which she hopes to complete soon. During her Master’s programme, she took part in a Summer School in Bern (Switzerland), and attended a conference in Tirana (Albania) where she had the opportunity to give a lecture on her research. As if all that were not enough, Joëlle also frequently worked as a student and research assistant. For example, she co-organized a conference in Groningen, helped set up a podcast about everything to do with funerals, called the ‘podkist’ (a wordplay on the Dutch word for coffin, ‘kist’), taught in several course units, and was involved in the Graduate School where she acted as Faculty beadle, among other things. Finally, she was also involved in the Alpha Support Centre where she helped secondary school students to transition to university and was a project leader for the Extended Essay Award.

In summary, Joëlle really does a lot of things, she excels at everything she does, and she also gave a great pitch for the jury. Clearly, she deserved to win.