In February, SwissCore welcomes its new trainee Elisa Elhadj and bids farewell to Anja Meier.
It is probably common to all institutions and offices in Brussels; twice a year new trainees arrive and the experienced ones leave, ready to take the next step in or beyond EU policy.
Just moved to new offices on the second floor of Rue de Trône 98, SwissCore is already welcoming the first new trainee in the new setting. Elisa Elhadj joined us on 5 February for a six months internship until the end of July. Elisa is currently a first year Master student in European Global Studies at the University of Basel, and aims at complementing her academic insights into the European Union with practical ones. As a bilingual German and French speaker with a Bachelor in Political Science from Hawai’i Pacific University and California State University; she is certainly well equipped for her stay in international Brussels. During her time at SwissCore, Elisa will concentrate on Artificial Intelligence (AI) Policy with a focus on the implications for research and innovation (R&I). She will analyse AI priority actions in the European knowledge programme and derive opportunities and challenges for Switzerland. We are looking forward to working with her over the coming months!
Unfortunately, at the end of February we will also have to say Goodbye. Anja Meier will finish her internship as a trainee for research at SwissCore after six months. Anja joined the team in September 2019 after her Bachelor in International Relations at the University of Geneva and a final semester abroad at the Saint Petersburg State University in Russia. During her time at SwissCore, Anja took a deep dive into the worlds of responsible research and innovation (RRI) and Open Science, and elaborated a report, which will show how these areas evolve in the next R&I framework programme, Horizon Europe. She also used her excellent investigative and writing skills to supply the SwissCore Synopsis with a monthly success story on Swiss-EU cooperation in education, research and innovation. We were glad to learn that Anja will not be going far for the moment, as she will be taking up another internship at the Swiss Mission to NATO in March and staying in Brussels. We wish Anja all the best of luck for her future studies and career and hope to see her as a regular guest at SwissCore events and informal gatherings until she leaves Brussels in summer!