New Colleagues and Trainee at NorCore

From left: Margrete Søvik, Tiril Forsbakk and Jon L. Fuglestad

This spring, we are excited to welcome here new colleagues to our team. Margrete Søvik, from the Norwegian Directorate for Higher Education and Skills (HK-dir), and Jon L. Fuglestad, from the Research Council of Norway (RCN), will join NorCore on secondments of three months. Tiril Forsbakk will join us as this spring’s trainee.

Margrete works in the Analysis Division at HK-dir, where in recent years she has focused particularly on knowledge security and responsible international cooperation. She currently leads a project on higher education and democratic resilience. The ability to navigate a vast and complex information landscape and to exercise critical thinking is a central pillar of democracy and of societal resilience. During her stay in Brussels, Margrete will further develop the project and connect with relevant stakeholders working on knowledge security, democracy, and academic freedom – issues that are also high on the EU agenda. Together with colleagues from HK-dir, she is planning to organize the seminar “Democracies under Pressure: The Role of Universities” at the Norwegian House in Brussels in mid-April.

Jon is a special advisor in the Department for Ocean and Polar Research at the Research Council of Norway. He is the Norwegian member of International Arctic Science Committee (IASC) Council, and he is currently the vice-chair of Arctic Science Funders Forum (ASFF). Before joining the Research Council of Norway, he worked six years in the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme (AMAP) Secretariat, a working group of the Arctic Council. Polar issues, and especially the Arctic, have become more important the last few years and international collaboration is vital to increase our knowledge about the polar regions. The EU is a major player in polar research, and Jon looks forward to increasing his knowledge about the EU organisation, work tasks and meeting people who are involved with research in general and specifically polar research. It is very exciting to be in Brussels at this time with the process to revise the EU Arctic Policy, the new framework programme and the Multiannual Financial Framework

Tiril, our new trainee, holds a bachelor’s degree in European Studies from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), and is currently pursuing her master’s in the same field. As part of her studies, she has spent a semester abroad at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid in Madrid, Spain. Tiril has a strong interest in the EU and how the Union works as a global actor, and she is particularly interested in the dynamics between the EU and Associated Countries. She views these five months as a wonderful opportunity to build on previous knowledge of the EU and to build on this and gain a deeper understanding of where Norway fits in the vast EU puzzle. As a European Studies student, working in the heart of the EU provides invaluable experience, and she is happy to be a part of the NorCore team.

We are glad to have them join our team and look forward to the months ahead!