The CENIDE Peer Mentoring is a program for CENIDE researchers at an early career stage (PhD students and postdocs). Its goal is to develop the own personality and train important soft skills. In a one-year period a self-defined goal should be reached with the help of a peer group, which consists of other motivated early career researchers and experienced CENIDE mentors. This program offers the opportunity to learn a lot of things about yourself and to train personal skills, especially in (science) communication, negotiation and team-leading. Peer group meetings will follow the principle of a cooperative advice, which means that participants will be in both roles: a mentee who asks for advice but also a mentor, who gives advice. With mandatory appointments like workshops and seminars and a two-day retreat (including an overnight stay) a personal network is formed. In the end all participants will get a certificate for successful participation.

• Personal development
• Identification and support of own abilities, like:
  • Negotiation
  • Team-leading
  • How to express and achieve own goals
  • Science Communication
• Cooperative advice in peer groups
• Create a scientific network withing CENIDE

• Kickoff-Meeting
• Training Day with workshops and seminars
• Retreat including workshops, seminars and a meeting for mentors only
• Winter Party
• Final Ceremony
• Peer group Meetings (approximately every 6-8 weeks, self-organized by peer group and mentors)

• finish your recent research project or PhD thesis within one year
• build your own scientific network
• learn new things about project organisation and how to deal with stress
• boost your confidence in presentations
• and many more! It is up to you!

The mentors are junior professors and junior group leaders from the various disciplines of engineering, chemistry, physics and medicine. Further information will follow as soon as the program resumes

On March 20th 2023 we officially kicked off the CENIDE Peer Mentoring Program. After some initial words from the scientific director Heiko Wende and Miriam Böhm, coordinator of the program, the mentors presented themselves to all participants. After we also get to know the mentees the peer groups were finally getting together and had time for exchange. We are happy to have so many nice and excited participants and we are looking forward to the upcoming events like a workshop for the mentees or the retreat in autumn.

On September 11 and 12, the CENIDE Peer Mentoring Retreat took place at the Wasserburg Rindern in Kleve with our mentees and mentors. The retreat was all about communication: the participants presented their current research project in "3 Minute Thesis" presentations, found a treasure together in a team rally with small puzzles and tasks and to finish the retreat there was input from Dr. Sven Reichenberger on what successful team leading can look like. Additionally, the mentees collected initial ideas for the upcoming winter party. Overall it was a very enjoyable and eventful 1.5 days all!

On January 12, 2024, the winter party took place in the NETZ building! Since many of the mentees enjoy cooking, we cooked various participants' favorite dishes together and had a wonderful dinner all together. We had a lovely and fun afternoon with lots of delicious food and great conversations! Unfortunately, not everyone could be there, so some are missing from the picture.