With over 25 years of experience in the international higher education and the intersection between the public-private sector, I held various international leadership roles, focussing on cross-sector and cross-border collaboration, setting up and leading international consortia in Europe, Asia and North America (mostly Canada).

My work includes (new) educational and research program developments, social innovation and impacting. I work cross faculty with international teams on designing interdisciplinary, arts-based research and (short) educational programs around questions of social change, urban(in) justices, mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion and urban governance. In my current role at the Amsterdam University of Applied Science (AUAS – Centre of Expertise Just City) – I am involved in numerous advisory and research roles in the cultural and economic domain, working closely with the Municipality of Amsterdam (Community Wealth Building Economic Development and Urban Regeneration Nieuw West). My research is mostly practice-oriented, action based, arts-based and highly collaborative and participatory. I currently work in 3 neighbourhoods in the city of Amsterdam where topics like sense-of-belonging, hospitality and collective memory building play an important role in building urban environments for new residents finding a place, a process called ‘home-ing’.

I hold an MBA in Social Venture Innovation (University of Groningen, Netherlands) and an MSc in Communication Science and Media from the University of Amsterdam (UvA, Netherlands). I is the Chair/Director of the (non-profit) initiative Stichting Doubleyoutee (2021) and Chair of the Board Stichting TILT Performance Art (2021), two innovative experimental platform for artistic research and the incubating of open educational programs.