It’s the holiday season, and as we know it’s a season of giving and exchange. One way I want to acknowledge a “gift” I received this year is to talk about the importance of collaboration and free exchange of knowledge and information.

I’m currently working on my Master’s thesis, and it’s hard! It’s a new way of working for a student, applying creative and unique solutions to a novel question no one has answered before. It’s the first step into the world of self-driven research and academia, and it can be isolating and lonely – sometimes it’s just you at your computer trying to figure out a problem on your own.

But sometimes, you get the opportunity to say at your research group (that’s us in CEG <3 ) meeting “hey, my code isn’t cooperating, does anyone have any ideas?”, and you are overwhelmed by multiple people around the table and on the call switching on and throwing out suggestions. “I’ve had this kind of problem before!” “Have you tried approaching the problem from this angle?” “That’s so frustrating! I don’t know how to help, but I can validate your experiences!”. It’s wonderfully refreshing, and it can really reignite the spark after hours or days struggling with the same problem.

The next step after an MSc for someone who wants to continue in academia is a PhD. Now, obviously, I haven’t had a PhD position before! I can and did do research – how do you find a position? How do you apply? What are they looking for in a CV? But nothing compares to time spent with the talented, competent and kind technicians, PhDs, postdocs, co-Masters students, and supervisors, who have pieces of advice, 5 minutes to read your CV, or even an hour or two to help you re-write it. They help me and inspire me. In turn I took some of the advice I got from them, and shared it with a friend who’s in the same position as me. It’s a privilege to receive their wisdom, and an honour to be able to pay it forwards.

Another way I gave and received gifts this year was through an internship opportunity. I travelled to the University of Barcelona Deep-Time Evolution lab, and it was a wonderful experience. I brought the knowledge I’d gained through working on my thesis – insights and opinions from papers I’d read, and troubleshooting problems I’d encountered – to help them approach and set up similar pipelines to mine. In return, they offered their expertise and perspectives, giving me new ways to view the biological mechanisms underlying my project.

All in all, I’m a firm believer that academia is a team sport. There’s a lot to be said for individual effort and spirit. I’d like to think I’m self-driven, self-sufficient and capable, but realistically we coalesce into research groups and departments for a reason, papers have long lists of co-authors for a reason, and we thank our groups, our friends, and our pet fish in the acknowledgement section of our theses for a reason. So thank you to everyone who’s helped me this year, I’m humbled and grateful, and I’m excited to be able to pay your generosity forward for years to come.

I’d like to thank the members of CEG, everyone who comes to eat lunch on the second floor of Colletts hus, my Masters supervisors, my lecturers, the members of the Deep-Time Evolution Lab at the University of Barcelona, the three other guys taking GEO4212 with me this semester, Petter who processes sediment samples with me, everyone who was a group teacher for BIOS1100 and BIOS1150 with me this semester, everyone who spoke at the Tangled Banks seminars, my housemate Anne, my parents and brother, my friends from Kristiansand, my friends in Oslo (especially “Loke’s Angels”), my friends from my music group (especially the “Silly Little Boys”), Alessandra, and perhaps most importantly of all, my small aquatic friends who live in the fish tank in my room <3