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Jasper's day

On January 1st Jasper Knoester started as our new dean. How is he finding it? What kinds of things is he doing and what does his day look like? In each newsletter Jasper gives a peek into his life as dean.

Tuesday 14 June

‘The day starts in Leiden, with a quick breakfast in the hotel. Three more weeks before our family moves here from Groningen, so these breakfasts in an anonymous atmosphere will come to and end soon. 

Then it's time to go to the office, where I make a few phone calls before the weekly meeting of the Faculty board. Today's meeting has a large number of decisions to make, but most of them are simple. This leaves time at the end for reflections on larger strategic issues, often the most enjoyable part of our meetings.

Afterwards I receive Mr and Mrs Mondt. In 2016 they established the Swaantje Mondt Fund, in memory of their daughter, which is managed by LUF. This fund gives students, PhD students and postdocs in Natural Sciences and Law the opportunity to carry out part of their research abroad. Young foreign researchers can also come to Leiden to do part of their research. It is a great pleasure to talk with them about their background, about their strong belief in the usefulness of international experiences for personal and professional development and about the latest developments in the Faculty. On Monday, together with Annetje Ottow, I had already met some other great donors. We should be very grateful to these people for their commitment and generosity. I have resolved that we will bring the existing funds more to the attention of staff and students. 

'On the way back, my son and I watch the Dutch national football team'

 In the afternoon, a meeting is scheduled that I have been looking forward to for a long time. With Pieter Schipper, Head of Academic Affairs of our faculty, I visit the 'Space' Campus in Noordwijk. Before coming to Leiden I had no idea that Leiden is part of a rich ecosystem around the theme of space. We are welcomed by Esther Peeters, director of the campus. She gives an introduction about the campus and the connections within the region. Joerg Wehner gives us a more detailed look at ESA (European Space Agency), the biggest player in Noordwijk. It is impressive how much money is involved in ESA. It is more than 7 billion euros annually, half of which passes through Noordwijk. Joerg emphasises that he would like to strengthen the ties with our Faculty across a wide range of disciplines. We agree to have a more substantive discussion on this soon. We already have good contacts through the Observatory and I see it as an interesting option to extend these to other disciplines. 

 After this introduction, we visit the departments of ESA where materials and parts for satellites and equipment for space missions are tested under the extreme conditions that can occur during the mission, such as temperatures, radiation, vibrations, vacuum. If you are leading a project of hundreds of millions of euros or more, you want to invest in certainties! We conclude in the Concurrent Design Facility, an impressive room full of workstations with screens. Here, a multidisciplinary team of dozens of people can work simultaneously on the design of a mission and, in eight sessions of four hours, spiral towards the optimal solution. Is the mission technically possible? Within the budget? Can it be realised on time? I wonder if we could do something with this design approach in the university context. 

 After the bike ride back, I quickly go to Voorburg, where our son Kamiel is taking part in the basketball selection training these weeks. He's really enjoying it and afterwards, to our delight, we hear that there's a good chance he'll be joining the team. We run to the train and spend our journey to Groningen watching the Dutch national team. At 10.30pm we arrive in Groningen, after a varied and successful day.’

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