PARTICIPANTS 2022.

Originally from Lüneburg, Northern Germany, Merle holds a Bachelor’s degree in Franco-Romance Studies and Political Science from the University of Bremen. Different internships and semesters abroad brought her to Paris, Bordeaux, and Brussels. Pursuing a Master’s degree in European Interdisciplinary Studies at the Warsaw campus of the College of Europe allowed her to complete these experiences with a deeper understanding of the European integration process and the European Union’s relations to global and emerging actors. Since graduating, Merle has been living and working in Hamburg where she could gain further practical experience in European and international cooperation as well as civic education.

Kamila Biddle works as Head of Communications at CEC Group Prague office, a leading public affairs agency in Central Europe. Before joining CEC, she worked at ŠKODA AUTO, where she was responsible for corporate communications as a spokesperson. She has been working in public relations and marketing for two decades and has extensive experience in both, the commercial and non-profit sectors. She focuses on strategic brand image building, marketing communications, and CSR. She holds a degree in Diplomacy. In her free time, she is interested in art, nature, philanthropy, and she loves to spend time with her family and friends.

Simona Binko, art historian and cultural manager, is interested in cultural exchange between the Czech Republic and Germany. She studied art history at the Charles University in Prague and at the Freie Universität in Berlin, where she received her M.A. in Art History in a Global Context. Currently, Simona works at the Czech Centre Berlin, the cultural institute of the Czech Republic. She is responsible for the program of the gallery, curates the series of talks on architecture ‘archint’ and is involved as project coordinator in some projects of EUNIC Berlin, the European Union National Institutes for Culture. 2020 she founded SALOON Praha, a network of women art professionals in a growing number of cities worldwide. Since 2020 she has been working as art historian on the research project Industry and arts „Bringing the World Home. The Binkos and Josef Gočár“, based at the Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague.

Lenka is a regional officer focusing on EU Affairs communication. She studied Spanish for Business and Spanish Translation at University of Ostrava. She discovered her passion for International Relations during her Erasmus studies in Spain. Shortly afterwards she started to work for local information centre dealing with EU topics and since 2017 she has been employed by the Office of the Government of the Czech Republic. Lenka is responsible for organization and management of local events, giving lectures at schools and wide range of organizational tasks. She also acts as a local multiplier of Eurodesk network focusing on youth opportunities and active citizenship in Europe. Recently she was also seconded to the European Commission as a Nation Expert in Professional Training. Lenka enjoys every opportunity to link up with new people and explore other cultures. She is an active mentor of European volunteers, a travel lover and a strong supporter of lifelong learning.

David is a doctoral candidate in Eastern European History at the University of Munich, where he previously earned degrees in History and Middle Eastern Studies. For his PhD project on German academia in interwar Prague, he holds a scholarship from the Konrad Adenauer
Foundation. His broader research interests include politics of memory, nationalism and nation building in Central Europe. He is an alumnus of the Max Weber Programme of the Free State of Bavaria as well as of the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union, having spent two semesters abroad at the University of Edinburgh. Due to his own familial roots in Moravia, David is keenly interested in Czech-German cooperation and is a regular attendee at related events, such as “Meeting Brno”.

Hannah Illing is a postdoctoral researcher in economics at the University of Bonn. Her main area of research is labor economics; in one of her projects, she analyzes Czech-German migration. Before joining the University of Bonn, Hannah completed her PhD at the Institute for Employment Research (IAB) in Nuremberg. She is alumna of the Bohemicum Regensburg-Passau program, and completed several research stays in Prague.

Ole is currently studying industrial engineering in Brandenburg and close to graduate his bachelor. As a working student at 50Hertz Transmission GmbH in Berlin, he is participating in the digitalization of the energy transition since 2019. In the data driven apartment he supports the implementation of IT-systems, ensures the functionality of energy data exchanges and is responsible for their master data and encrypting. He wrote his bachelor thesis on the communication between electric cars and their charging stations. The focus was on how to use the communication to implement a system where people can choose their own energy supplier to charge their car at a public station. It all matches with his personal interests in modern ways of transportation and sustainable energy systems.

František is currently working at the German Embassy in Prague, in the economic department. He holds MA degrees in global history and energy economics from universities in Berlin and Leipzig. He has professional experience from both private, public and academic sector. Among his career focus is energy security, hydrogen economy and sustainability and climate-impact reporting.

Martin currently works at the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action. Previously, he spent four years in the Czech Republic as DAAD Lecturer for German and EU Law at Charles University. He studied law and political sciences in Bonn and Prague. During his doctoral studies, he worked at the Institute of Public Law in Bonn and experienced living in New York and North Carolina as Visiting Scholar at Columbia and Duke Law Schools. He received scholarships by the Fulbright Commission, DAAD, Zeit-Foundation and the German National Academic Merit Foundation among others. As much as he liked the US and New Zealand, where he spent three months of his legal clerkship at the German Embassy, the region which interests him most historically and culturally remains Central Europe. He considers himself lucky that his favourite hobbies of reading, cycling and boardgames turned out to be very much pandemic-compatible.

Patrick is from Hamburg, Germany and holds a Bachelor´s degree in Logistics (Economics) from the Hogeschool van Arnhem en Nijmegen in The Netherlands. During his studies he also spent a semester at the Vysoká škola ekonomická v Praze, as part of the Erasmus Programme. He has worked for several multinational companies in the food sector in Germany. After graduating university, he also spent a year in Czech Republic working for one of the worlds´s largest breweries in a logistics capacity. Here he participated in a number of projects, such as Change Management and a project on implementing an intermodal transportation strategy. After moving back to Germany he has worked
in a number of roles within the field of logistics and fast-moving consumer goods. Outside of work he is an active member in the German Federal Agency for Technical Relief (Technisches Hilfswerk), where he participates in training exercises as well as calls to calamities and disaster zones.

Toni Skorić works as Desk Officer for European Dialogue at the Unit Europe of the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom in Potsdam. Before that he served as a Project Manager for Central Europe and the Baltic States in the Prague office of the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom. In addition, he gained work experience as an Expert Associate at the Department for International Affairs in the Croatian Parliament, an intern in the German Bundestag and as a trainee in the Directorate General for Translation of the European Parliament in Luxembourg. He studied German and Czech Language and Literature for Translators at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences of the University of Zagreb and is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in International Relations and Diplomacy at the Open University of Catalonia. He speaks Croatian, English, German and Czech.

Kateřina is originally from Prague, Czech Republic. She has studied Middle Eastern Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London and Israel Studies: Politics and Society at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. In her work, she has largely focused on the non-profit sector. For the past three years, she has been working in the field of humanitarian aid and development cooperation for the NGO Caritas Czech Republic. She has been the Desk Officer for Georgia, served as Acting Head of Mission in Mongolia and currently works as the Senior Desk Officer and Regional Coordinator for the Middle East. This autumn, she is planning to go back to studying for a year to pursue an MSc in Migration Studies at the University of Oxford.

Born and raised in Belarus, inspired in Germany, settled in the Czech Republic. Galina studied translation, intercultural communication and international relations in Minsk and finished her third master’s degree at the Charles University in Prague (German and Austrian Studies) in 2014. Since then, she has worked for German multinational software company SAP as financial specialist for DACH region in the shared service center based in Prague. Prior to her relocation to Czechia, she was employed as translator from German, English or Spanish in Belarus. Internship at the German Bundestag in 2008 (International Parliamentary Scholarship) changed her life in many ways, not only because she met her future husband there. Galina likes to divide her free time between family & friends, modern and classical literature in European languages and travelling. Further she enjoys cross-cultural nuances of her everyday life.

Marie-Cecilie is a senior consultant for the inhouse consultancy of the German public sector in Berlin. She manages projects focusing on the digitalisation of administrative processes for citizens and companies. She did her Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration at the University of Münster. As part of her degree, she spent a term at the Wroclaw University of Economics, Poland. Currently, she is finishing her part-time master’s degree in Business Consulting and Digital Management. Marie-Cecilie took part in several international youth forums and summer schools.