Miriam Luizink appointed director NWO-I

The board of the Institutes Organisation of NWO has appointed Miriam Luizink as director of NWO-I with effect from 1 October 2020. Together with the recently appointed director of operations, Jan van der Boon, she will lead the Institutes Organisation of NWO into a following phase of development based on the newly established governance model.

Sampling the mood at CWI during the coronavirus crisis

Gradually buzzing back to cross-fertilisation

Since 18 May, NWO Institute CWI (Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica) has been open again. The receptionist is back behind the desk to welcome you, and the employees can work at the institute on a rotational basis. As soon as you enter the building through the revolving door, you notice the signs and stickers reminding you to keep a distance of 1.5 metres. Disinfecting tissues hang in the lifts, and there are posts with cords in between to ensure that colleagues cannot accidentally get too close to each other.

Sjoerd Wouda new Central Health & Safety Coordinator NWO-I

The board of NWO-I has appointed Sjoerd Wouda as Central Health & Safety Coordinator for NWO-I with effect from 1 June 2020. In close collaboration with the Health & Safety coordinators and environmental advisers from the NWO Institutes, he will be responsible for maintaining an up-to-date Health & Safety and environmental policy for the entire NWO-I organisation.

Survey provides insights into options for part-time working from home in the future

NWO and NWO-I, together with the Central Works Council (COR NWO), are conducting a survey on how employees experience working from home during the coronavirus measures. We are curious to discover your insights into working from home.

Highlight Nikhef: tinkering from Amsterdam during the coronavirus crisis on the LHCb detector in Geneva

Due to the coronavirus crisis, research Institute CERN in Geneva, Switzerland, is largely closed. CERN only allows the most essential activities to take place. Permission was given for two RF (radiofrequency) boxes, produced by Nikhef, for the particle detector LHCb to be placed in the subterranean detector hall at the end of May. The RF boxes are two ultra-thin aluminium boxes that encase the heart of the LHCb detector at the point where the protons from the LHC particle accelerator will collide with each other. The operation, which was partly carried out by Nikhef technician Freek Sanders, was remotely followed and supervised by fellow technicians from Nikhef in Amsterdam via a Zoom video link.

Text CAO-OI 2020 available

The full text of the Collective Labour Agreement Research Institutions 2020 (CAO-OI) is now available on the Dutch NWO-I website. The English version follows shortly. The CAO-OI contains agreements about employment conditions, including salary and leave days, which must be taken into consideration in the individual employment agreement. On 6 March 2020, the CAO parties converted the CAO negotiators’ agreement of 4 February 2020 about the new Collective Labour Agreement Research Institutions 2020 (CAO-OI) into a final agreement.

News from the Central Works Council

The NWO Central Works Council (COR NWO) has published its Annual Report 2019 on the NWO-I website. Furthermore, COR NWO has issued a positive recommendation concerning the appointment of a new director for NWO-I. COR NWO is also pleased that a new Central Health & Safety Coordinator has been appointed.

About NWO-I

NWO-I, the Institutes Organisation of NWO, is an independent foundation belonging to NWO. The following nine institutes are part of NWO-I: AMOLF, ARCNL, ASTRON, CWI, DIFFER, Nikhef, NIOZ, NSCR and SRON. The 200-plus workgroups in which physics research takes place at Dutch universities and knowledge institutes are also part of NWO-I.

Contact

NWO-I
www.nwo-i.nl
info-nwoi@nwo-i.nl
(030) 600 12 11

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