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On 1 November, Bas Mesters will take up the position of editor-in-chief of Utrecht ľ¹Ï¸£ÀûÓ°ÊÓ's independent university media outlet (DUB). He succeeds Ries Agterberg.

Bas Mesters (1965) studied cultural history at Utrecht ľ¹Ï¸£ÀûÓ°ÊÓ and began his journalistic career at the Utrechts Universiteitsblad. In the intervening years, he has worked for Volkskrant, NOS, NRC and De Groene, among others. In addition to his extensive experience in journalism, he is familiar with working within knowledge institutions. For example, he was director of the Expertise Centre for Journalism at the ľ¹Ï¸£ÀûÓ°ÊÓ of Amsterdam and has been chairman of the editorial board of the university magazine Univers since 2021.

As editor-in-chief, he will have final responsibility for the journalistic direction, content and quality of DUB and will lead the editorial team. Mesters will focus on further strengthening DUB's visibility and maintaining a critical, accessible and reliable journalistic voice within the academic community. In addition, he wants to work with the editorial team to develop podcasts and further nurture democratic dialogue within the university community.

‘I am looking forward to leading the medium where my own journalistic career once began,’ said Mesters. "It feels like an honour and a responsibility to now contribute to independent journalism within the university in this role. There is a lot going on in the world of students and staff: budget cuts, developments in the US, protests outside the university. Now more than ever, an independent news medium is particularly important and adds value. Together with the editorial team, I want to continue to earn the trust of our readers and further strengthen our role as a critical platform with room for constructive dialogue and debate."

Mesters' appointment was the result of a careful process, supervised by a selection committee consisting of representatives from the editorial team, the Communications Department, and the editorial board, including a student member. The editorial board approved Mesters' nomination as the new editor-in-chief.

‘We were looking for an editor-in-chief with a clear journalistic vision and connective leadership,’ says Kees van den Bos, chair of the DUB editorial board, "and we found that in Mesters. His extensive experience and strong conviction that constructive-critical journalism plays a central role within the university make him ideally suited for this position. He knows how to motivate people in a pleasant way and he stands for thorough university journalism. I think we as a university community will benefit greatly from this.

DUB is the independent news and opinion site for the university community in Utrecht. The medium operates on the basis of journalistic independence, anchored in an