New scientific talent is networking at the KU’s Young Researchers Day

What do I have to keep in mind when I start my PhD project? How do I apply for third-party funding? What is important in appointment pro-cedures? At the Young Researchers Day at the Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt (KU), the main focus was set on issues related to ca-reer and research.

In the first week of October, the team “Academic Career/Young Researchers” of the Research Service Center (ZFF) welcomed around 130 participants from different qualification stages to the KU - students in Master’s programs as well as postdocs. 

The KU was able to offer the young researchers a varied and informative program via the video communications platform Zoom. The presentations covered the core topics of the different qualification phases, such as publishing, employment conditions and career paths. Besides the ZFF staff, other facilities and services of the KU shared their expertise with the early-stage researchers, such as the International Office, the University Library, the Departments of Legal Affairs and Human Resources, the Women and Equal Opportunity Officer, the Family-Friendly University and the Methods Service Center.

For the first time, the Young Researchers Day had a guiding theme: “Good scientific practice”. “A lot is happening in this field in the scientific community at the moment,” says Dr. Magdalena Schönweitz, research officer at the ZFF. The Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) has published guidelines for safeguarding good scientific practice, thereby putting in concrete terms its idea of scientific integrity. “This is about more than only plagiarism and manipulation, this is about good cooperation in science. And that also means recognizing the contribution of early-stage researchers.” According to Schönweitz, a culture change is due, and that is going to take a lot of time. She thinks that makes it all the more important to integrate the issue of good scientific practice in everyday academic life in a sustainable manner.

One highlight of the Young Researchers Day was the panel discussion on the topic “Good scientific practice in research and teaching”. Besides Prof. Dr. Jens Hogreve, Vice president for research at the KU and Prof. Dr. Joost van Loon, former ombudsman for good scientific practice, Dr. Thomas Brunner was also on the panel. As head of the interfaculty board of examiners, Brunner drew attention to teaching - as good scientific practice starts with simple seminar papers.

The last item of the program went to show what research can look like in the best case: the awarding of the prizes for the film contest “90 Seconds – Getting to the Heart of Research”. Young researchers had been called to submit a video that explains their research concisely and understandably. The audience chose the following winners: Moritz Altmann, Jakob Rom and Fabian Fleischer from the Department of Physical Geography with the film on their research project on the influence of climate change in the Alps.