The Dutch Cleantech Challenge is really kicking off, and we are pleased to announce the grand prize for the winner in the Netherlands! There will be a 3.000,- Euro prize for the winner of the Dutch Cleantech Challenge on top of the 10.000,- Pound prize for the Global Cleantech Challenge winner in London. Even more of a reason for you to participate!

To meet your fellow participants and form your team, subscribe now to attend our Networking Event on February 9th. With an innovation workshop by the Club van Delft, experts in enabling you to grow your idea!

The next step is to enter your idea in the form of 200 words by the 12th of February, after which a professional panel will select the twenty best ideas to go through to the next round! Aside from prize money, you will be able to attend workshops by McKinsey, GIMV, Alstom and have the privilege of pitching your idea to investors. A once in a lifetime opportunity!

What are you waiting for?

Here's your chance to grow your green idea!

Visit the website or like their page on Facebook to set things in motion NOW!

The PCDI Postdoc Retreat is a 3-day course for final year PhD students and postdocs in the Life Sciences and focuses on personal, professional and career development of young scientists.

Last month Promood celebrated the typical Dutch tradition of Sinterklaas with a whole bunch of its PhD members (and also one or two non-members who heard about the event through hearsay and decided to show up!) and it was a lot of fun! Every year Promood organizes the gift-exchanging event for Sinterklaas where everyone brings a small gift of up to 5 euro, which then gets thrown in a bag, shuffled with all the other gifts and distributed back to the participants. The gifts tend to be humorous and this year they ranged from pineapples all the way to collections of old classic books, complete with the tattered and stained look!

Whether you want to join next year's gift exchange or not (it's entirely optional, you can still show up without a gift, just don't expect one back), the party itself is still lots of fun and a great way to chill with your PhD colleagues before the Christmas holidays.

Wondering what the event looked like? Then read on for the photos!

This interfaith dialogue training gives you the unique chance to spend a weekend with people of different beliefs in a relaxed atmosphere. In a world where religion increasingly becomes part of conflicts it is of great importance that believers of good will start a genuine dialogue with one another and mobilize the positive forces in our religions to create harmony and peace. Dialogue is an attitude that can be learned. During this weekend you will be introduced to the so called Socrates method as a meaningful tool for dialogue in many situations. We will listen to people who are involved in dialogue in the Netherlands. We will also have the opportunity to attend a prayer in a mosque and in a church and we will open and close the day with our own prayer traditions.

You can browse the flyer here.

"Lending people, not books"

The idea is to form a collection of living books, people with a nice story to tell. Then we will have a get-together of a small group of PhDs and the rector, and two chosen living books will tell their story, followed by an informal discussion.

Help PromooD find interesting people to become living books! You can send your submissions to This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .