The MER community makes a stop in Bordeaux

The “MER family”! They don’t know it yet, but the twenty or so students who are about to start their first semester of study in Bordeaux within the European Master programme in marine sciences are set to become part of much more than just a course: a genuine global community. And the timing could not be more symbolic. As the programme celebrates its 20^th anniversary and brings together nearly 200 of its alumni in Bordeaux for its second Community Summit (the first took place in 2022 in Bilbao), the MER Master programme secured new European Erasmus Mundus funding in July. Originally focused on marine environment and resources (hence its original name "Marine Environment and Resources"), it has gradually evolved to place increasing emphasis on the challenges of ocean protection and conservation. Renamed MER2030 in 2022 and currently "Sustainable Ocean Sciences: Marine Environment, sosMER" (2026–2032), it now supports part of the key challenges set by the United Nations Decade for marine sciences in the service of sustainable development (2021–2030). To understand how this "MER family" came into being and expanded, we need to go back to 2005. That year, Ionan Marigómez, a professor at the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU) - described as a "visionary" by Jörg Schäfer, the Bordeaux-based coordinator of the Master programme - identified, together with his colleagues, a need: to train scientists with marine specialisms that existing degree programmes did not then offer.

Navigating different university systems and regulations

But these twenty years have by no means been plain sailing. “Often, the lessons learnt one year are of no use the following year.” Running a joint Master programme on an international scale requires navigating different university systems, academic calendars and regulations, as well as harmonising the recognition of grades and administrative procedures. The French system is certainly no exception when it comes to complexity: unlike the other partners in the consortium, the University of Bordeaux is still unable, for national regulatory reasons, to award the joint degree. Added to this, over the years, have been upheavals that were difficult to anticipate: Brexit, Covid, international conflicts and changes in migration policies. “A joint programme takes many stakeholders out of their comfort zone,” sums up Ionan Marigómez.

Not only the key players… but the students too. For if there is one phrase that frequently comes up among the graduates interviewed, it is "stepping out of one’s comfort zone". This phrase takes on several meanings here: moving to a different country and university, working in English, encountering other cultures, but also engaging with scientific disciplines very different from one’s own. “Oceanography is not a single discipline, but is by its very nature multidisciplinary,” points out Jörg Schäfer, professor of environmental geochemistry at the Oceanic and Continental Environments and Palaeoenvironments Laboratory (EPOC*). Biology, chemistry, geology, physics: students arrive with different backgrounds, which they learn to combine in order to understand marine sciences.

Andrea Osorio (class of 2019-2021), an environmental engineer originally from Colombia, decided to devote her career to the ocean after discovering kelp forests - large brown seaweeds - during a stay in California. An Erasmus grant enabled her to join the programme in Europe, where the breaking down of disciplinary barriers proved to be very tangible: whilst carrying out fieldwork in the Arcachon Basin, she - not being a biologist - had to learn, amongst other things, how to identify the animals she encountered and their scientific names. This interdisciplinary approach is reflected, years later, in the careers pursued by the graduates. Teba Gil (class of 2013-2015) now combines experimentation, geochemical modelling and machine learning to study the fate and environmental impact of elements crucial to the energy transition in aquatic environments. Cassandre Aimon (class of 2013-2015), now a senior lecturer at the University of Bordeaux’s EPOC laboratory, combines behavioural science, physiology and molecular approaches to study the effects of environmental pressures on aquatic organisms.

Beyond the knowledge they acquired, the Master programme has often played a decisive role in their subsequent careers. The research placement undertaken by Melina Abdou (class of 2012-2014), who is now a support officer for research project coordination and scientific management within the university’s research departments, led her to undertake a PhD in the same Bordeaux-based laboratory, EPOC. This Master programme also paved the way for Cassandre Aimon to pursue a PhD, before she returned to the University of Bordeaux as a lecturer and researcher. Teba Gil, too, sees it as a key factor in her journey towards her PhD at the University of Bordeaux and subsequently an international career in research, culminating in her recent position as a researcher at the CNRS. For Héloïse Gilbert (class of 2023-2025), the turning point came more recently: having arrived without knowing whether she wanted to pursue a career in conservation or research, she chose the latter following her coursework and dissertation. She is now undertaking a research-based Master degree in Scotland focusing on the age and origin of plastics found on the Scottish coastline. Andrea Osorio, meanwhile, worked as a research technician at the University of Exeter in England, notably on a project focusing on plastic pollution in the Galápagos.

Fitting an entire life into a single suitcase

And the skills acquired sometimes continue to resurface many years after graduation. More than ten years after her statistics courses, Teba Gil explains that she still uses the R programming language - which she discovered during her statistics classes - in her research work. Melina Abdou says she still draws on her English, the professional network she built up during her Master degree, and her knowledge of the academic environment. Héloïse Gilbert, for her part, cites both her ability to juggle laboratory work and data analysis and her ability to navigate the world of research. But stepping outside one’s comfort zone is obviously not limited to the laboratory. It also involves experiencing different academic systems and improving one’s proficiency in several languages, as the graduates mention, as well as learning to find accommodation in each new country and, in Héloïse Gilbert’s words, "fitting one’s whole life into a single suitcase". And when they look back on their two years, scientific and personal memories inevitably intertwine: a field trip to the Arcachon Basin or Corsica and the discovery of a magnificent nudibranch - a sea slug; an evening at the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao; the sunsets in Plentzia during the Covid pandemic; the Eurovision Song Contest evenings… And travelling sometimes brings more unexpected encounters: Andrea Osorio, for example, met her partner during a BlaBlaCar journey that was taking her to Liège for her third semester.

For Jörg Schäfer, who has co-ordinated the Master programme for Bordeaux for the past 16 years and has just been appointed Vice-President for European affairs at the University of Bordeaux, this represents a “personal and institutional international outlook”. He also recognises the impact of the programme on students who, he emphasises, know why they are there and are aware of the opportunity they have been given. And when Ionan Marigómez, in turn, looks back on the journey so far, he recognises that this impact extends far beyond the two years of study. Around 600 students from over 70 nationalities have now graduated from the Master programme, and some are returning to contribute to the programme as lecturers, supervisors or employers.
The Summit organised in Bordeaux to mark this anniversary provided an opportunity for several generations to come together - from the very first cohorts to current students - to discuss their journeys, their research and their experiences. And when alumni are asked what they would like to pass on to those starting out today, the advice is consistent: stay curious, persevere, reach out to lecturers, make the most of internship and project opportunities, build connections, travel… and above all, make the most of these two years, which, as they all say, fly by. This is advice that all the alumni present will no doubt be keen to share, here in Bordeaux, with the new intake as they, in turn, prepare to embark on the MER adventure.