Nine new seed funding projects were developed between researchers CEITEC MU and Twinning partners. These projects involved secondments of researchers and enabled the expansion of the range of methodological approaches, formulation of relevant research questions, and contribution to international exposure of young scientists.
In the second half of the project duration, CEITEC researchers and students gained knowledge in specific scientific skills by participating in the courses and trainings at partners.
During the project, CEITEC organized three RNA Summer Schools and invited experts in their fields. Each Summer School lasted five days and was opened for ESRs from Masaryk University and Twinning partner institutions. Participating students were encouraged to share the knowledge they gained from the summer schools during PhD retreats and lab meetings.
CEITEC facilitates the scientific lectures under the ongoing Seminar Series and other scientific events. The experts from Twinning partners were invited to speak about their area of expertise and relevant topics.
IMB organized transferable skills trainings each year and hosted CEITEC researchers from RNA research groups. Participants of the courses were regularly encouraged to disseminate the knowledge from the training among their peers.
We assisted CEITEC PhD and postdoc committees in organizing social events to help networking and knowledge sharing with the RNA cluster communities. We also organized PhD and Postdoc retreats once per year and invited ESRs and postdocs from Twinning partners. The retreats were used to disseminate the project results from small collaboration projects, trainings, internships, and RNA Summer School. The retreats were also used as a meeting place for peer groups to foster peer mentoring and discussions on various career paths with peers.
We wanted to prepare our young researchers for the various career paths and career challenges they can face by means of mentoring and career guidance at the institutional level. We implemented CEITEC Thesis Advisory Committee that involves mentors from our partner institutions.
To help our young researchers, we also published 3 documents - Career Development Plan (a publicly available concept for integration of career development counseling into mentoring) and Lists of desirable skills based on self-reflection within ESR and postdoc peer groups.
Every three months we organized the joint telco "Career Café Live" with at least one RNA alumni from the partner institution to prepare young researchers for various career paths. The alumni shared their career stories and were available to answer PhD students' questions on the career difficulties and varieties of paths that a student can take to overcome the challenges. Totally, we organized twelve career cafés. Six of those alumni were asked to participate in the podcast where they elaborated on specific career topics.
In the frame of WP4,JGU organized webinars for CEITEC research management staff twice a year. The webinars helped strengthen contacts with partner institutions, understand different research support systems, compare knowledge and experience in the field, and exchange practices.
We also supported two research managers to participate in the international conference EARMA which is in their area of expertise.
At the beginning of the project, heads of research management appointed department members to go for shadowing at one of the Twinning partners. All employees shared the gained knowledge during department meetings at CEITEC MU.
During the Final Project Meeting, we organized a one-day retreat for research management to diagnose the significant topics at CEITEC MU, share the experience gained from the secondments, and develop a didactical concept to be further implemented at CEITEC MU.
To disseminate the project results, we organized the RNA PhD Conference that served as a platform for PhD candidates to present their research findings in the field of RNA, and promote the RNA cluster at CEITEC. Also, seven selected talks or poster presentations at external conferences were supported to present results achieved jointly by CEITEC researchers and partners.
