Summer 2025 has been rather intense. Whereas I usually feel like I get a bit of breathing room during my summer research stay, this year has been super busy. As in the past periods, my main focus is on writing…
I was thinking recently about how I want to expand the impact of my research, and I identified that my focus lies on (and yes, I got this list from the MSCA Staff Exchanges call): international expansion interdisciplinary expansion inter-sectoral…
Since I spent only a limited amount of time every year in the Netherlands, I make a list of priorities for my research stay to make sure I take full advantage of my time. While I've discussed my particular priorities…
Continuing from my previous post, here is my second set of lessons learned to celebrate my 40th birthday: From my father: excellence in your work matters to you and those you serve with your work. From my father: if you…
I recently turned 40, so let me share 40 lessons with you. Today, I'll share the first 20 and in my next post the next 20. From my mom: if you need to do something hard, just go step by…
Some time ago, a colleague asked me about the benefit of national groups of international associations. Within IABSE, for example, we recently restarted the Ecuadorean group. ACI and ASCE also have their national groups in the country. Here's what I…
This post is part of the series PhD Talk for AcademicTransfer: posts written for the Dutch academic career network AcademicTransfer, your go-to resource for all research positions in the Netherlands. These posts are sponsored by AcademicTransfer, and tailored to those…
As the editor in chief of ACI Avances en Ciencias e Ingenierias, I have seen a fair number of faux-pas. If you want to improve your chances at getting your paper accepted for publication, avoid the following mistakes: Not using…
Most of us academics have a few unfinished, unsubmitted papers that are gathering digital dust on our computers. Projects may have stalled, the writing never got finished, students may have moved on and left the last items pending, or we…
As I spend my summers in the Netherlands every year, I have developed a set of checklists to streamline the process (I like a good checklist, in case you hadn't noticed yet). Here's the set of checklists that I use:…
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