President, Prof. Dr. Sierd Cloetingh travelled to Wageningen University in the Netherlands on the 17 th May 2018, to present how COST promotes and spreads research excellence at the at the 5 th Annual Wageningen PhD Symposium.
The theme of the symposium was ‘Bridging science and society: unifying knowledge’ and included three sub-themes: technology and innovation, from fundamental to application and society matters.
President Cloetingh presenting at the 5th Wageningen Symposium
‘Pockets of excellence can be found everywhere in Europe and COST has the tools and instruments at its disposal to unlock the untapped potential’ explained President Cloetingh during his keynote address. He also defined COST’s three priorities, which are ‘promoting and spreading excellence, fostering interdisciplinary research for breakthrough science and empowering and retaining young researchers and innovators.’ To implement these priorities, COST have introduced new initiatives such as COST Connect events and the COST Academy .
Prof. Dr. Cloetingh also presented how participation in COST has led to significant results and follow-up in terms of the number of submitted proposals for collaborative research in Horizon 2020. ‘By networking researchers and innovators from all career levels, from PhD students to Nobel Prize winners, COST connects complementary funding schemes and facilitates entry into these schemes.\’