“For me, the Master’s programme Biomolecular Sciences was a perfect follow-up on my Bachelor Molecular Life Sciences. I really valued the possibility to study life sciences with a chemistry-undertone. Also, I liked to study at a different university than my Bachelor’s to see and explore a different environment. Finally, the programme had courses that sounded interesting to me and the Master coordinator was really helpful as well."
“The programme really met my expectations. Beforehand this is always a question of course, whether or not the Master suits your goals and expectations. But for me it was the perfect combination of biology and chemistry, because that was what I wanted to study. No organic chemistry, and no medical biology."
“After graduation I had two options. Applying to Stanford university for a PhD programme where I did my final Master internship or start a PhD in the lab of Prof. T. Sixma at the Netherlands Cancer Institute. Since the enrolment of the graduate program at Stanford was already finished, I had to wait a full year to start my admission there. And, the graduate programme would start with courses and lab rotations, similar to internships. At the moment of graduation from VU, I felt I was ready to do a PhD instead of waiting. Also, I knew that the PhD programme in the Netherlands is excellent and I could always perform a post-doc position abroad to gain international experience. I therefore made the decision to start a PhD at the Netherlands Cancer Institute. This was not an easy choice but I realized during the first years I made the correct one.
“While finishing my PhD I knew I did not wanted to continue in a research position. Although I liked working at the lab, I realized that my enthusiasm for science was big but not as big as my colleagues. Perusing a career in academia needs hard work and eagerness to learn more and discover more. I missed that part, and therefore it would not work for me. Nevertheless, I loved what I did so I felt I wanted to stay close to science and research."
"One month before my graduation I started working at Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) as a programme officer. I was not sure if the job would fit me, but it did! I am super happy that I could start my non-academic career at NWO. The programme officer has a quite diverse profile. I am involved in running financial calls (VENI talent program, Open Technology Program) together with my colleagues, we need to find jury and committee members for different stages of different calls that NWO runs. Finding international referees that are willing to use their expertise to review a proposal during the application process. And, a programme officer has a portfolio of many projects that were honored by NWO and where the programme officer guides the user committee of the project. This is very diverse and fun.”
