UMCG Postdoc Council

The UMCG Postdoc Council represents postdoctoral researchers at the University Medical Center Groningen, advocating for their interests locally and nationally. It promotes inclusive representation, clarifies postdocs’ roles, and facilitates guidance, career development, and wellbeing support to enhance their professional growth.

The Council’s major achievements have been the support of postdocs at the UMCG who had been wrongly assigned a lower salary scale and advocating for their proper compensation. Furthermore, our career events and postdoc information sessions have encouraged networking and forged career opportunities for postdocs at and outside of the UMCG. Lastly, we have established a relationship with the Dean at the Board of Directors of the UMCG and meet bi-annually with him to advocate for postdocs’ most current and pressing issues.

We work towards a better understanding of the term ‘postdoc’ and which (types of) researchers we want to focus on in the UMCG, striving to obtain equitable and sustainable compensation. Moreover, we work towards an increase in opportunities of permanent contracts at the UMCG, improving postdoctoral wellbeing and career opportunities. Overall, we envision a research environment where researchers are fully recognized as essential contributors to academia and science.

As mentioned, we represent and support early career researchers in the postdoctoral phase of their academic journey. More specifically, this includes:

• Researchers classified as ‘Researcher 3 & 4’ who are on temporary contracts and are in the initial stages of building their academic careers.
• Clinical academics engaged in postdoctoral research during the early phases of their academic development.

While our primary focus is on these researchers in temporary positions, we also serve as a point of contact and referral for Researcher 3 and 4 individuals on permanent contracts, offering guidance and directing them to appropriate institutional resources when needed