HAInews 2023/02 New alumni groups launch with many activities

On the initiative of Stefan Beljean, research associate at the Max Weber Institute for Sociology (MWI), the new group “MWI Alumni” was founded. When he took up his position two years ago, in which he also supervises students' theses, the institute's former active alumni work had meanwhile fallen asleep and that there was also no sociology group in the HAI network, so there was no institutionalized opportunity for graduates to maintain contact after their studies. Thanks to his efforts this now has changed and since March the new group has been established. It organized a first event right away and continues planning further ones: On 23 May, four sociology alumni from different business fields reported on their everyday professional lives and careers as part of the “Career Perspective” event series, organized by HAI together with the university's Career Service for students. Two other events of the institute in the summer semester were also addressed to alumni: the summer party of the faculty on 22 June and the legendary institute barbecue organized by the student council on 26 July. Explicitly for alumnae and alumni, the new group is planning a reunion in the fall.

In spring, the author Hanna Osadko, winner of the Hilde Domin Award, lived in an artist's residence in Heidelberg's old town. Thus the reading organized by Lena Botezatu and the HAUA core team could take place there, featuring a selection of short stories and poems from her book “Einfach leben” ("Just Live"), published in 2017 – well before the war. The event was attended by Ukrainians who have lived in Heidelberg for a long time, as well as current refugees from the war. “What connects all the works in Hanna Osadko's book is an ease and, from the present perspective, the absence of the great war that has dominated the lives of all Ukrainians:in since 24 February 2022,” explained Lena Botezatu. “We really enjoyed this journey back in time to peaceful life, but also, above all, Hanna Osadko's acting talent with which she performed her works.” Most moving, she said, was Hanna Osakdo's poem about Penelope – the female character from Greek mythology who waits 20 years for her husband Odysseus to return home. The poet's own life path took a different course from that of Penelope and Odysseus as her husband Oleksandr died at the front in the summer of 2022. Her new book, which she wrote in Heidelberg and which is named “Seven Chocolates from Heidelberg,” is dedicated to him.