According to the statutes of the GFZ, the Scientific Council has the right to "listen in" on the decision-making processes of the Executive Board and the Directorate and to contribute its voice on scientific matters in an advisory capacity.

Among the questions that preoccupied this year's newly elected Scientific Council at the beginning were, for example: How can the work of Ombudspersons at GFZ and at RIFS be structured and defined to support and implement good scientific practices? Or: How can we constructively contribute to the ongoing GFZ strategy process? The Council is also involved in finding suitable candidates for the (external) Scientific Advisory Board.

The fourteen-member Scientific Council is roughly equivalent in size to the Directorate, which is made up of the Department and Topic Directors. The council either chooses its own working topics, whereby it likes to be inspired by the suggestions of its colleagues. Alternatively, it is actively asked by management committees to assess a particular topic. Often, the Scientific Council also invites experts or persons affected by the topic to its meetings in order to obtain a comprehensive opinion. Only then are written recommendations made to governing bodies.

Election in March 2023

In March, all scientific staff members working at the GFZ and Research Institute for Sustainability (RIFS) were able to stand for election for the three-year term of office.

Kirsten Elger, who is responsible for the GFZ data services on a full-time basis, has now become the new chairperson of the council. She would like to take this opportunity to once again thank all eligible voters for their votes and is particularly pleased with the high voter turnout of 64% as well as the election results, of course. The new members come from the Research Institute for Sustainability, which has been part of the GFZ since January, as well as from all five GFZ departments. The membership is gender-parity and a balanced mix of different career stages. The council includes post-doc representatives, working group leaders, laboratory managers, infrastructure experts, theoreticians and applied researchers, all of whom are highly motivated to give meaning and benefit to their new position.  The members also reflect well the research topics of the program-oriented funding.

At the constituent meeting in April, the members - twelve of whom were sitting together in the room for the first time - mainly clarified organizational matters, such as the type of communication within this body as well as externally, and they gave thought to urgent issues. These urgent concerns include, above all, the strategy process: "In a timely manner, we want to deal with the strategy process currently underway as well as alternative concepts for evaluating scientific performance," says Henryk Dobslaw, vice chair of the Scientific Council, adding: "We would very much like to encourage all employees to contact us at any time if they would like to give more visibility to a specific topic related to the scientific orientation of our Centre."
 

• Webpage Scientific Council / Internet : https://www.gfz-potsdam.de/en/about-us/organisation/board-bodies-administration/internal-scientific-council
• Webpage Scientific Council / Intranet: https://intranet.gfz-potsdam.de/en/about-us/boards/internal-scientific-council 
• Contact: wiss-rat@gfz-potsdam.de