On a dull Monday morning halfway August 2019, we received amazing news from the Dutch government: the award of a gravitation grant of almost M€20 for ten years of research… This was a good reason to drink some champagne at 10.30 AM.
A month later, in September, our team and five other teams received the awards from Minister Ingrid van Engelshoven of the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science, at NWO’s headquarters in The Hague.
A few months later, on 10 January 2020, we had a scientific kick-off featuring great speakers (Eiko Fried, Denny Borsboom, Marcel van den Hout, the PI’s of our consortium and the president of Maastricht University: Martin Paul). We enjoyed a delicious vegetarian buffet followed by a big dance party: a swinging start of the project!