I joined Hasselt University in August 2022 as the European University Alliance Manager, responsible for the implementation of EURECA-PRO across UHasselt. Within the European University for Responsible Consumption and Production, I coordinate our membership and liaise the UHasselt community with those at our partnering universities.
Before coming to Hasselt University, I was an Associate Professor in Criminology at the School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research (SSPSSR) at the University of Kent, Canterbury, UK. For 6 years, I taught and convened post- and undergraduate modules, such as the ‘Sociology of Cybercrime’, ‘Theories of Crime and Harm’, ‘Qualitative Research Methods’, ‘Cultural Criminology’ and ‘Crime, Media and Culture.’ Since 2019, I also acted as the Director of Studies for Criminology. I have been a gang researcher for 15 years and published on this topic in various peer-reviewed journals. I was awarded a PhD in Criminology at KU Leuven in December 2015 and obtained a M.Sc. in Criminology (2006) and Social and Cultural Anthropology (2007), both at KU Leuven. I was a visiting researcher at UCLA in 2014.
Since the start of my PhD, I set up various international networks, collaborated with people of very diverse cultures and socio-economic backgrounds and operated in many different academic settings. Encouraging more international and intercultural collaboration, strongly rooted in academics and university life, turned out to be my true passion. So my current job feels like a perfect fit.