Since December 2022, Dipl.-Geol. Caroline Maas has been part of the Graduate Academy team, financed by the structural funds of the BMBF program, to develop structures for young scientists at Clausthal University of Technology, from doctoral candidates to newly appointed researchers who have not yet been made permanent. Its activities focus on supporting young scientists on their academic career path, with a particular focus on the target group of postdocs at Clausthal University of Technology. After graduating in Geology/Palaeontology, Ms. Caroline Maas worked at the Institute of Geotechnics and Mine Surveying and then on the staff of the Presidential Board of Clausthal University of Technology for the first audit as a family-friendly university in 2006. After a family-related break, she studied a Bachelor's degree in Social Work at the HAWK in Holzminden, which she completed in 2013 with the award for the best thesis of the year. Since 2012, she has been a research assistant at the HAWK in various research projects and in science management.

The targeted promotion of young academics at universities beyond purely technical training is increasingly becoming a cross-sectional task in the German academic system. In a globalized scientific world, excellent scientists are not only qualified to work in interdisciplinary, national and cultural teams through disciplinary skills. Increasingly, the training of outstanding young scientists is focusing on the acquisition of communicative, culturally sensitive and multi-, trans- and interdisciplinary skills. Clausthal University of Technology has been meeting this challenge for several years by establishing the Graduate Academy, which has been expanded in terms of staff as part of the BMBF's Tenure Track Program.

"I have acquired my expertise in program development for early career researchers at HAWK Hildesheim|Holzminden|Göttingen since 2016. The aim was to develop structures and offers for young academic staff and doctoral students and thus strengthen applied research with a strong regional focus at the university. As a former graduate of Clausthal University of Technology, a new role at the Graduate Academy of Clausthal University of Technology appealed to me and that special attention should be paid to the group of postdocs."