Stine Korreman received the prestigious JCD Prize and a personal gift of DKK 25,000 at the annual PhD Day at Health. The award is presented to the best PhD supervisor of the year. A special feature of the award is that supervisors are nominated by their own PhD students.

In the nomination letter, the students praised Stine Korreman not only for her professional competencies, but also for her unique ability to supervise on a personal level and to create a safe work environment. The award recipient was very touched by the nomination.

"The JCD Prize is probably the best award you can get. Supervision is a huge part of my daily work and it’s one of the things I'm most passionate about, so receiving this honour means a lot to me," says Stine Korreman.

A bridge builder and interdisciplinary researcher

Stine Korreman’s previous positions include head of department at RUC. She is currently a professor of physics at the Department of Clinical Medicine and chair of the faculty's PhD committee. She is working on bridging the gap between disciplines. She has spent many years making significant contributions to integrating new technology in cancer treatment. In recent years, particular focus has been on artificial intelligence.

"My work is ultimately about ensuring better treatments for patients. It’s one of the things I'm most proud of in my career - to have helped develop technologies that are used in practice today and to have improved treatment methods for many patients by bringing technology into the medical world," says Stine Korreman.

Today, Stine Korreman is very involved in developing and accessing AI in cancer treatment, both at Danish and European levels. She is also one of the chairs of a new working group at Aarhus University and the Central Denmark Region, which focuses on the use of AI on the health area.

"Artificial intelligence is exciting in and of itself, but what's even more exciting is how we can use it to improve treatments in the future. What can we do better and who can we do it better for? Answering these questions requires the collaboration between many different competencies and profiles, which is why my group of PhD students is quite diverse," she says.

"It's about seeing the whole person in each PhD student"

However, it’s not just Stine Korremans' professional competencies that make her a remarkable supervisor. According to the PhD students, Stine is great at creating a safe and supportive work environment where everyone feels valued as researchers, individuals and as members of a larger community.

"Supervision takes up about half of my working hours, when I add everything together. I try to make sure that I have weekly supervisor meetings with each of my PhD students, as well as weekly group meeting where we all get together and talk about our projects," says Stine Korreman and continues:

"It's about seeing the whole person in each PhD student and each PhD student as part of a bigger whole. That may sound trite, but I can get annoyed at the tendency in the world of research to create this ideal archetype of researchers as total nerds who forget everything around them, including eating, and who have no life other than what goes on in the lab."

According to the professor, the stereotypical perception of the researcher role is a myth she is working hard to dispel. For Stine Korreman, it is important that her PhD students are able to balance work and private life.

"Of course some people thrive on dedicating themselves fully to research, but I honestly don't believe that it’s a healthy or positive ideal. It's okay to be passionate about your work, but I make it clear to my PhD students that family comes first. I believe that a healthy work environment, with people who have a good work-life balance, leads to better research and healthier researchers," says Stine Korreman.

Focuses on feedback and a strong social environment

According to the PhD students' recommendation letter, Stine Korreman approaches supervision in a way that encourages openness, trust and community spirit - all of which are key elements in a productive and healthy research environment.

She sees herself as a kind of sponsor for her students' careers and emphasises the importance of giving them room to explore their own interests and goals. "It's about trusting them, supporting them and nudging them forward," she explains and continues:

"It's important for me to create a culture where giving and receiving feedback is a constructive process. PhD students often have a clear idea of where they want to go, and helping them find out how to get there is my greatest responsibility."

Stine Korreman feels it is important that her PhD students get along well with each other and build a strong community with other researchers at the same stage of their academic careers.

"I'm very focused on creating a strong team environment and making sure everyone knows they are part of something bigger than themselves. I think it’s really important that we work together as a group: that we cultivate a community and help each other. During Covid-19, we had a weekly online cocktail hour on Friday afternoons, where we met up and chatted about anything and everything over a video call. We’ve continued this social life and students regularly organise social events together. That makes me very glad," says Stine Korreman.

At a loss for words at the award ceremony

The JCD Prize was presented by three of her PhD students during Health's annual PhD Day gala dinner.

"It was very touching. I knew the award was going to be presented to me and I had prepared myself mentally for it. But when the students stepped forward and said such moving words, I was speechless. I had prepared an entire acceptance speech, but completely lost it. I'm a fairly experienced speaker, but the rug was pulled out from under me," says Stine Korreman with a laugh and continues:

"Being nominated for an award like this actually means a lot more to a supervisor than students might realise. There are so many areas in the world of research where we measure quantity - how many articles we publish, how many citations we get, and how many lectures or conferences we attend. But supervision is an area where we rarely know whether we are doing something that actually makes a difference to students. So receiving an acknowledgement like the JCD Prize, makes me very happy and proud."

Click here to read more about PhD Day 2024 in the article from Inside Health.

Contact

Professor Stine Sofia Korreman
Aarhus University, Department of Clinical Medicine - Danish Centre for Particle Therapy (DCPT) and
Aarhus University Hospital, Department of Oncology
Email: stine.korreman@clin.au.dk