Drs. Astrid Wissenburg

Organisation

University of Exeter

Job title

Director of Research 

Biography

Drs. Astrid Wissenburg is Director of Research at the University of Exeter. Astrid’s responsibilities include the delivery of the University Research and Impact Strategy, including research institutes; REF preparations; and research culture, environment and infrastructure. Astrid oversees Research Services and the Doctoral College. Research Services supports all academics in the University in bidding and delivering research projects, and works closely with our colleges on supporting their research strategies Our Doctoral College supports our post graduate research community and early career researchers.

Astrid’s career has been focussed on making knowledge and research accessible and usable, as widely as possible. She is currently chair of the Board of Trustees of the Careers Research and Advisory Centre (CRAC), CRAC is the UK's leading expert in the field of career development for postgraduate researchers and manages Vitae on behalf of the UK Research Councils. She is a past trustee of MentorUK, and was until 2016, a member of the UUK Open Access Group. Astrid's previous roles include Director Research, Scholarship and Quality at the Open University and Deputy Chief Executive at the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). Astrid also led for RCUK on its economic and societal impact strategy, and on open access policies. Her early career included appointments at King's College London, Glasgow University and Leiden University.

Astrid holds Dutch postgraduate degrees in contemporary international history and in IT, and a Master of Public Administration from Warwick Business School. In 2019, she obtained a MSc in Systems Thinking in Practice from the Open University, with her dissertation ‘Lost in Translation. Incentivising research and innovation in UK Higher Education – a systems analysis.’