Thessaloniki 2020 speakers

Johannes Gehringer
Is a Policy Officer for Erasmus+ Higher Education at the European Commission in Brussels.

Johannes has work experience in EU external relations and cooperation (audiovisual, culture) as well as in EU education and training policies and programmes. He is interested in EU affairs, international relations, foreign policy, education and culture.

Nina de Winter
Is a member of the Executive Committee of the European Students’ Union (2019-2020). She has an academic background in International Relations (U. Groningen – NL). Besides her work for ESU, she is working on Lesvos for the NGO Yoga and Sports for Refugees. She has been involved in student representation on local and national level (Dutch National Students’ Association (ISO)). Her expertise lies amongst others within the areas of quality assurance, student-centered learning, internationalization of education.

Stéphanie Deveze-Delaunay
Is a legal expert at the French ministry of higher education and research. She is working on national and European legal texts about life long learning, internships, gap year, students’ entrepreneurship.
She has been working on the theme of internships for 14 years, after being legal director in university Montpellier 3 and experiences in the private sector. She has created the internship’s French national legal agreement at the end of 2014. She has organized for five years the French national conference about internships in Paris. From 2017 to 2020, she is coordinating the European strategic partnership SPRINT.

Line Pillet
Is Head of the Institute of Entrepreneurship & Management (IEM), University of Applied Sciences & Arts Western Switzerland Valais-Wallis.

IEM offers open and collaborative innovation spaces based on key values such as creativity, responsibility and sustainability. It works as a regional catalyser to reinforce innovation capacity and increase local business competitiveness. We are a dynamic team of 35 professors from various fields and researchers (economists, engineers, psychologists, computer scientists, coaches) offering a unique combination of practical experience and insight into current and future challenges.

Key focus areas include: service design, business model innovation, competitive intelligence, strategy management and energy management. We are also actively involved in collaborative projects both at national and international levels aiming at supporting the accelerated transformation of organizations, in particular the digital transformation, through systemic, integrated and interdisciplinary approaches.

Elke van der Valk
Works as Consultant Regionalisation & SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) at Fontys University of Applied Sciences and responsible for connecting Fontys as knowledge partner to the regions in the South of the Netherlands. She also advises the institutions of Fontys on how to integrate SDGs into education & research. She is part of the SDG Coalition that was created amongst Universities of Applied Sciences in June 2018 and coordinates the platform www.sdgsonstage.nl, which is created to connect students, teachers and businesses through SDG-related content and internships. She is multilingual, and the reach of her work is intercontinental: she has been the Erasmus+ Coordinator at Fontys, coordinated grants and scholarships at Utrecht University of Applied Sciences and overseen European projects at Casa de la India, bringing European and Indian cultures closer together through educational, cultural and cooperation projects. Elke is currently a Steering group member in the Expert Community Employability of the European Association of International Education.

Martin Martinkovic
Is the Policy and External Relations Advisor, Smarter Universities and Skills of the Future Consultant in IBM International Services Centre, Slovakia. Among other he is in charge of the company university collaboration programs and successfully managed the implementation of several innovative programs at universities with the focus on improving the preparation of graduates with the current and future skills required by employers in the current world of business.

Zuhal Guvener
Is the International Relations Office Manager at International University of Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Zuhal is experienced Deputy Director with a demonstrated history of working in the higher education industry. Skilled in Research, English, Teaching, Higher Education, and Curriculum Development. Strong education professional with a Master’s Degree focused in English Language and Literature, General from International University of Sarajevo.

Ana Cecilia Boa- Ventura
Has over 20 years’ experience in European Programs. She is International Officer at the Polytechnic of Leiria, in the coastal center part of Portugal where she works in the framework of international traineeships, faculty members mobility, a Consortium of 8 Polytechnics and 122 companies- unique in Europe given the special characteristics it holds- and she has experience in organizing international events and working with Joint Master Degrees. The Polytechnic of Leiria is one of the 3 biggest Polytechnics in Portugal and has over than 1200 international students- she has the background and the know- how of working directly with the students during all the changes of the Erasmus program from a pilot program in Business administration as the first Polytechnic in Portugal applying to Erasmus until to Erasmus +. She is from Lisbon and holds a grade in Law (University of Lisbon) and a grade in Para Legal Studies (Polytechnic of Leiria) and a Master in International Relations- European Studies namely in the area of International Higher Education Studies (University of Coimbra) and she is preparing her doctoral degree in the frame of EU relations with Eastern Countries in what concerns Higher Education (University of Coimbra). She was also a Fulbright grantee of market driven Higher Education and has several papers published namely on financial aspect of the European Commission funding, Multilingualism, Relationship between University-Industry. Attended numerous workshops and seminars both as speaker or attendee mostly in issues connected with European Higher Education programs and she speaks four languages.

Regarding Leo-Net she has been attending to the yearly seminar for the last 14 years and she has a special interest in activities connected with Higher Education with the intervention of the European Commission.

John David
Is the founder and CEO of Amnick – Social Enterprise based in London, UK and Editor in chief of City Pulse magazine (10m circulation)
John is leading the International Collaboration Team made up of City Leaders, Mayors, 110 Tech companies, and Universities from around the world. This team focuses on city challenges, technologies and developing training and work experience opportunities for students, graduates and unemployed people.

Julia Chiperi
Is the International Work experience manager in Amnick, London, UK. Leading on UK’s first innovative e-work experience programme.

Developing programme initiatives to make this opportunity more accessible on a national/international level by everyone who seek work experience. Offer a great choice of work experience areas for office based jobs. Support, mentor, guide those on the programme, customising the programme to individual’s needs, offer back to work support and opportunities and meet the requirements of current market jobs.