After two online versions and one Summer School at the University of Regensburg, we were finally able to host this year’s second Summer School at the monastery in Plankstetten. As this was the first PhD gathering since the pandemic situation has started, we were all extremely happy to meet other PhD students in person.

Upon arrival at the monastery, the heavy rain forced us to stay first a bit inside. After an hour in which we did a short self-presentation round and heard about the different RIGeL groups, the rain luckily ceased. Hence, we continued with the Team Event “Archery”, which helped us to get to know each other better. Divided into five groups, we first learned the technique and then played against each other. It was lots of fun! In particular the attachment of air balloons on the targets increased the team motivation and ambition. Counting the results per round allowed us to identify a winner team that was awarded with a pink bottle of prosecco at the end!

 

Every PhD student of in total 38 persons actively participated in the program either by giving a talk or presenting a poster. All in all, there were six talk sessions and three poster sessions that were distributed on the three days. Each talk session was moderated by one PhD student that paid attention that the time of the presentation was not extended and coordinated the order of questions from the audience. Overall, each presentation was lively discussed. At the end, the people who contributed to these discussions with most of the questions were awarded as the “Five best questionnaires” by receiving a voucher of the City of Regensburg: Simone Larivera, Julian Sax, Valerie Bezler, Thomas Kinateder and Luisa Jaimes.

 

For the first time, the poster session took place in a very informal and free atmosphere so that everyone could switch between the posters of the session independent of others. This was a great success because also longer and more detailed discussions were possible.

 

On the last day after completing all the sessions, everyone was asked to vote for the best poster and talk. The heterogeneous results pointed out that it was not an easy decision. Nevertheless, we identified the winners with Lina Pedraza for the best talk and Michael Jüttner for the best poster. Both of them received a voucher of the City of Regensburg.

In addition to our talks and posters, Dr. Alexander Nyström and Dr. Lisa-Marie Dürr enriched our program as invited guest speakers. Both talks provided very deep and interesting insights into their work and their career paths with all important decisions they had to face. Their very honest and personalized presentations created an atmosphere in which we could ask any questions we had. As both speakers are working now in different fields (academia vs. industry), we got helpful impressions of possible future working positions. Thanks to the speakers!

Furthermore, Dr. Fabian Queck presented the MINThouse of Regensburg. He provided a great overview about the development, the execution of building the MINThouse and the idea behind it. Due to the big opening a day later, his presentation was online – so, we hope that everything went alright and that the MINThouse will be full of pupils learning how fascinating science is!

After the sessions on the second day, we could choose to participate at a guided tour through the monastery or simply use some free time to relax, to walk next to the river or to do whatever one prefers and enjoys. The monastery is nicely located in beautiful nature and there are so many things to discover – about the monastery with their concept of ecological and sustainable self-production of food and drinks but also trails around the building.

In the evenings, we had the possibility to stay in the vaulted cellar accompanied by table games and beer or wine from the own manufacture. It was great to socialize in person again!