Student prizes with a long history and a decidedly Leiden flavour
Before the Dies Festival for Alumni, friends, family, benefactors and thesis supervisors came to the Grotius lecture hall in the Kamerlingh Onnes building to celebrate the achievements of a group of young talents. These had been nominated for the Leiden University Thesis Prizes and the Schild-de Groen Research Prizes.
Annetje Ottow, President of the Executive Board, addressed the nominees. ‘You are, or are here to represent, the crème de la crème of our master’s students who without exception graduated with cum laude or summa cum laude honours. All nominated theses are of an exceptionally high standard’, she said. After the honourable mentions and the announcement of the runners-up, the moment had arrived: Whose thesis would be deemed the best master’s thesis of the year 2023-2024?
‘Her great dedication, enthusiasm and passion leapt from every page’
‘The jury was unanimous: the winner is Elleke Schreur’, said Ottow. ‘She explored the gap within policies on homelessness, which is often still seen as a gender-neutral problem. A topic that she was literally confronted with in the streets around our campus in The Hague. The jury said Elleke’s thesis was an absolute pleasure to read – it often felt like reading a real page-turner. Her enormous dedication, enthusiasm and passion leapt from every page. The research is extremely relevant. A well-deserved prize!’
Elleke is currently travelling and could not attend the ceremony, so her mother accepted the prize for her.
| First prize |
Elleke Schreur (Science in Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology, FSW) |
| Second prize |
Robin Neumann (International Relations and Diplomacy, FGGA) |
| Third prize | Scott Engels (Bio-Pharmaceutical Sciences, FWN) Spatially-aware computational methods to identify and characterize immune hubs in MERFISH data of colorectal cancer |
Schild-de Groen Research Prizes 2025
For 70 years, Rie Schild-de Groen was like a mother watching over ‘her’ gentlemen, the Minerva students in the ’t Heerenhoeckje house at Rapenburg 110. It affected her deeply to hear how former residents of the house had lost loved ones to cancer. Jaap Koster and a few of his former housemates helped set up her cancer research fund. This also led to the Schild-de Groen Research Prizes, which are awarded annually to students for a publication on cancer research.
‘She used AI software to analyse huge quantities of patient data’
The prizes were first awarded in 2024 and at this, the second edition, Jaap Koster was there to award them. First prize went to Justine Cuperus for her research on the incidence of pneumonitis in patients receiving various immunotherapies for non-small cell lung cancer. This serious side effect proved more common than reported in the clinical trials. The jury was impressed by the high standard of Justine’s work. The research was extremely well conducted and substantiated, and was carried out independently. With Justine unable to attend the ceremony, her boyfriend accepted the prize on her behalf. The winners of second and third prize, Scott Engels and Kim van der Gouw, also went home with a certificate, a bunch of flowers and a generous cash prize.
| First prize | Justine Cuperus (LUMC) The real-world incidence of pneumonitis in different treatment modalities of stage III/IV non-small cell lung carcinoma |
| Second prize | Scott Engels (FWN) Spatially-aware computational methods to identify and characterize immune hubs in MERFISH data of colorectal cancer |
| Third prize | Kim van der Gouw (LUMC) The establishment of an orthotopic HPV16 E6/E7-positive tumor model in MHC-humanized A2.DR1 mice |
The Leiden University Fund would like to congratulate the winners and nominees for this special achievement. On behalf of them and Leiden University, we would like to thank all those who support the Minerva Class of 1957/1961/1965/1973 Fund and the Schild-de Groen Fund.
See the photos of the ceremony in our online album.