Page 311 - Secondary school students’ university readiness and their transition to university Els van Rooij

Appendix V
About the author
Els Cornelia Maria van Rooij was born in Deurne, Noord-Brabant, on March 14, 1987. A er graduating from the local gymnasium she decided it was time for a change of scenery, so in 2005 she moved all the way up north to start studying Educational Sciences at the University of Groningen. She graduated cum laude from the bachelor programme in 2008, and completed her education by obtaining two master degrees: one in Childhood and Youth Studies in 2009 and one in Educational Design, Management, and Policy in 2010. From that point onwards, she let her interests and seemingly random opportunities guide her career choices. First, she worked as an educational consultant back in Brabant. en, halfway 2011, she thought it was time to try something she had always loved to do: teaching. She moved to Friesland and started in a job as a teacher in the art teacher training programme at a university of applied sciences. She taught courses ranging from developmental psychology to didactics. In the beginning of 2013, she moved to Nijmegen to work at another university of applied sciences, this time as a teacher of a social work degree programme. Although she enjoyed teaching, she started to miss the university environment more and more. is brought her back to Groningen in September 2013, where she worked for four years on her PhD research about the transition from secondary school to university. In addition, she taught the general didactics course in the teacher training programme, she supervised students’ research projects, and she supervised students during their internship at a secondary school. A er working on her teaching portfolio for a year, she obtained the University Teaching Quali cation (UTQ, or BKO) in June 2017. Outside of work, she kept herself busy by being a board member of GOPHER (Groningen Organisation for PhD Education and Recreation) for three years, a member of the PhD council of Behavioural and Social Sciences for 1.5 years, and part of the Program Team for the annual Groningen PhD day for one year. Furthermore, she was a volunteer at Coach4You for three years, which meant she weekly visited a grade 7 student from a disadvantageous background to help him or her with the transition from primary to secondary education.
Els currently works as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Groningen on two projects. At the Institute for Science Education and Communication of the Faculty of Science and Engineering, she investigates the reasons why science students do or do not choose to pursue a teacher education programme during their
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