Oana Romocea has built her career in scholarly communication at the University of Oxford and other academic and research institutions. Most recently she worked for the Public Policy Department of the UK's national artificial intelligence research institute, The Alan Turing Institute. At these institutions, she has worked with researchers at various stages of their academic careers, across all fields. Oana also draws on her experience in the UK academic sector and university administration and is involved in various cultural, educational and social initiatives in Romania. She is co-founder of the Romanian Science Festival, the first national science festival, and was a board member of Oxford for Romania for six years.
ROMANIAN SCIENCE FESTIVAL
Romanian Science Festival was founded in 2019. This initiative was born from the desire to involve Romanian researchers and students from the academic diaspora in the Romanian education system with the aim of attracting students to scientific disciplines.
In 2022, the Romanian Science Festival was awarded in Berlin by the Falling Wall Foundation in the Science Engagement category, the initiative being declared winner out of more than 1350 projects promoting STEM disciplines globally.
The RSF mentoring community is made up of more than 140 mentors who are Romanian students, researchers and professionals from the diaspora who get involved in different activities of the Romanian Science Festival: science fairs, webinars, online class visits, competitions. Since its launch in 2019, Romanian Science Festival has brought science to over 150 schools in Romania and reached over 100,000 students.
The festival has two main objectives. First, the festival aims to build a link between the academic diaspora and the educational environment in Romania, thus providing role models for success and career guidance to young people in Romania.
Secondly, the event aims to provide a platform for those who are passionate about science, thus cultivating local partnerships with local organisations, local initiatives and pre-university and university education institutions.
