Interviews with previous students

Johanna Myrseth

Johanna graduated in 2009 with a Masters thesis in Fisheries management: Managing marine fish populations under uncertain estimates. What are the benefits of stock information?

Why did you choose the Theoretical Ecology Group, and how did you hear about us?
During my Bachelor degree, I took a course in aquatic ecology with prof. Øyvind Fiksen where he introduced us to theoretical modeling. I was very fascinated by how one could explain/simulate nature with mathematical equations, and decided that I wanted to do my thesis using this type of research method.

Can you give a short summary of your thesis?
I did my thesis in fisheries management, studying how uncertainty in fish population estimates affects the annual harvest of the population as well as fluctuations in the population's biomass. The results have been presented at international conferences and published in a scientific journal:

J. Myrseth, K. Enberg, M. Heino, and Ø. Fiksen. 2011. Do accurate stock estimates increase harvest and reduce variability in fisheries yield? Natural Resource Modelling 24: 222-241. [ pdf ]

Did you have any expectations or ambitions about what you wanted to do after university?
Not really. When finishing my degree at the University of Bergen I wanted to broaden my academic background, so I continued studying a junior MBA degree at a business school in London.

Where do you work now?
I am currently working as an HR advisor in Norsk Gjenvinning, which is a large corporation in the Norwegian waste management industry.

Was it difficult to get a relevant job?
It was a bit challenging, as I finished my business studies at the commence of the financial crisis. I focused on choosing the industry I wanted to work in, and was open to many different types of positions.

Can you specify your main responsibilities at your workplace?
As an HR advisor I give advice and assist the organization in all kinds of human resources related issues, ranging from collective bargaining agreements to the Norwegian Working Environment Act (Arbeidsmiljøloven). Internal and external reporting on human resource indicators and statistics is also a large part of the position.

Is it possible to pinpoint any specific skills obtained during your education that have been particularly useful?
Analytical skills and being accustomed to working with numbers and equations have been very useful both during my business studies and in my daily work life afterwards.

Knut Wiik Vollset

Knut finished his Masters degree in 2006, and PhD in 2010.

Why did you choose the Theoretical Ecology Group, and how did you hear about us?
My main supervisor, Arild Folkvord, in the Fisheries ecology and Aquaculture group, suggested that I should collaborate with modelers. I contacted prof. Øyvind Fiksen, and he became my co-supervisor during both my Masters and PhD degree.

Can you give a short summary of your thesis?
I worked with growth and survival during early life stages of two populations of Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua) in large outdoor mesocosms. The results contradict some of the earlier findings of population differences.

Where do you work now?
After finishing my PhD in December 2010, I was hired by Uni Environment, to work with wild salmon ecology and the interaction between wild fish and farming and river regulation. I belong to the sub-group The Laboratory for Fresh water ecology and inland fisheries.

Was it difficult to get a relevant job?
No, but I think the reason I got a job right after my work was the fact that I started looking for work up to 8 months before I finished my PhD. I wrote research application, job applications and called places that I found interesting to let them now that I was soon to be available on the job market. I got a phone call back the Monday after I defended my thesis asking if I could come to a job interview.

Can you specify your main responsibilities at your workplace?
I work as a Senior Researcher and do both field work and publish articles on anthropogenic effects on wild Atlantic salmon and trout.

Is it possible to pinpoint any specific skills obtained during your education that has been particularly useful?
I definitely think that the relatively versatile background from my education helped. I have worked with several topics during my PhD and Masters and even got to publish a couple of articles unrelated to my thesis work. Also I was abroad both during my Masters and PhD. I believe that this will demonstrate to an employer that you manage to be independent. Also, I purposely took several courses in statistics during my education. That has helped me a lot in participating in all sorts of projects, and is a good way to stick out in a crowd of applicants.

Knut has published several articles from both his Masters and PhD work. You can find more information about his work here.

Knut Wiik Vollset in the field . Uni Environment performs regular salmon and trout surveys all accross southern Norway.

Kristian Andvord

Kristian graduated in 2008 with a Master thesis in Fisheries management: Activitiy and space-use in European lobsters from ultrasonic tracking in a marine protected area .

Why did you choose the Theoretical Ecology Group, and how did you hear about us?
I chose the Theoretical Ecology group because their competence was relevant for the type of problems I wanted to investigate in my Master thesis. I also had close collaboration with the Institute of Marine Research, in Flødevigen, Arendal, where I did my fieldwork.

Can you give a short summary of your thesis?
My thesis was on the behavioral ecology of the European lobster, and was part of a larger research project which investigated whether establishing marine protected areas is a suitable means to rebuild the depleted lobster stocks. I investigated lobster movement and activity patterns by tracking lobsters marked with radio acoustic tags.

Did you have any expectations or ambitions about what you wanted to do after university?
I wanted to work with fisheries management.

Where do you work now?
Shortly after graduation I started working as an adviser for the Norwegian Ministry of Fisheries and Coastal Affairss. The Ministry is responsible for the management of the fisheries and aquaculture industries in Norway.

Can you specify your main responsibilities at your workplace?
My work is primarily concerned with developing and implementing environmental policies for the fisheries and aquaculture sectors.

Is it possible to pinpoint any specific skills obtained during your education that has been particularly useful?
Most important is probably the training in critical reasoning and general problem solving that I got during my Masters degree. Also, the general understanding of the dynamics of marine ecosystems is particularly useful in my current job.