The second edition of the ERA Shuttle Summer School took place from 22–26 September 2025 and was hosted by the University of Gdańsk’s International Centre for Cancer Vaccine Science. This week-long training programme empowered researchers through a blend of lectures, hands-on sessions, and wellbeing-focused activities tailored to the realities of a high-pressure research environment. Participants explored a wide range of themes, including soft skills development, AI productivity tools and their ethical use, research funding strategies, technology transfer, and innovation and entrepreneurship. All sessions were designed to support career advancement in research and innovation, foster interdisciplinarity, and bridge the gap between academia and industry.
The first day focused on “Career Development and Scientific Leadership”, with Daniel Mertens from Schiller Mertens and Lucia Smit from Braingain looking into utilising AI tools for career planning, decision making, hiring and retaining talent, and PhD transition.
The second day, “Research Productivity and Digitalisation”, opened with a novel presentation by Angie Mifsud, an employee at the University of Malta, and Ela Kurtcu from Steinbeis. Ms Mifsud, who has just completed her secondment through the ERA Shuttle framework at Steinbeis, has joined forces with Ms Kurtcu from Steinbeis to set up a joint initiative focusing on how to empower academics for sustainable futures, connecting personal, professional and planetary wellbeing. Their initiative serves as living proof of the type of innovation that the ERA Shuttle cross-collaboration and secondment opportunities are bringing forward. The day continued with a thought-provoking session on the responsible, ethical and compliant use of AI by Evita Milan from Steinbeis, and concluded with a session on distributed research infrastructure, lead by CERIC’s representative, Gianluca Romanin.
Rebecca Zammit, the Head of EU Projects at AcrossLimits, led the full programme of the third day, leading the group through a series of logical, step-by-step workshops that broke down the EU proposal writing process into bite-sized pieces. The aim was to ensure that attendees understood the techniques and thought process behind each element of proposal writing, from concept development, consortium development, writing project objectives and KPIs, developing an Impact and Dissemination strategy, and determining the project Work Plan.
The fourth day focused on the fundamentals of Knowledge and Technology Transfer, knowledge valorisation and open science, and reducing barriers between technology and knowledge transfer staff and industry, with sessions on the topic lead by Bernard Denis from ASTP, Elena Sultana from University of Malta, and Angela Zennaro from CERIC.
The Summer School concluded its final day by spotlighting Entrepreneurship, Commercialisation and Project Building. Sessions by Daniel Mertens from Schiller Mertens, Marcello Turconi from CERIC, Ivana Marsic, an expert collaborator of AcrossLimits and David Gardiner from ASTP looked at various related aspects, from building projects with AI tools, pitching to investors and research funders, bridging the gap between scientific research and non-academic stakeholders, and the fundamentals of innovation, entrepreneurship, and entrepreneurial spin-off skills.
The Summer School served as an opportunity to engage in meaningful conversations and learning opportunities for over 40 researchers, research managers, and technology transfer officers, highlighting the R&I potential available to us thanks to European collaboration. We now look forward to the future edition of the Summer School, whilst continuing to encourage staff members of the Universities of Malta, Gdańsk and Split to apply to carry out their own secondment – a short-term work experience placement of three to six months at an industry partner to focus on their personal and professional development.