Institute hosts Summer Internship for Pupils
Students from local school gain hands-on experience in Organic Synthesis
Instead going to the beach: Eight students from local Luisenschule in Mülheim are spending a week at the Max Planck Institut für Kohlenforschung. Under the guidance of technicians Roland Petzold and Felix Waldbach from Prof. Tobias Ritter’s Organic Synthesis Department, they are gaining firsthand insight into the day-to-day operations of a leading research institute.
Instead going to the beach: Eight students from local Luisenschule in Mülheim are spending a week at the Max Planck Institut für Kohlenforschung. Under the guidance of technicians Roland Petzold and Felix Waldbach from Prof. Tobias Ritter’s Organic Synthesis Department, they are gaining firsthand insight into the day-to-day operations of a leading research institute.
Julia carefully places the oil bath under the round-bottom flask. Together with the other seven students, she sets up a reaction in the institute’s teaching lab. Their goal: Over the course of this week, they aim to produce substances that the scientists in Prof. Ritter’s research group actually use in their work. Knowing that their work makes a real contribution helps the students stay focused and take their tasks seriously.
Roland Petzold and Felix Waldbach find the group to be attentive and curious: “It’s nice to see that the students are genuinely interested in what we’ve prepared for them,” says Roland. Over the past few years, the Ritter group has expanded its collaboration with the Luisenschule and created a tailor-made program for the young people. This summer, too, the young women and men have been asking a steady stream of questions, whether about safety, synthetic routes, or data analysis. “That’s exactly the goal of the week: to give them a hands-on experience of the working environment at a scientific institute, beyond textbooks and exams,” explains Felix.
Over the course of the week, various analytical instruments join the fume hood and workbench in the teaching lab: During visits to different service groups, the students learn about key analytical methods—NMR and mass spectrometry, for example. What often remains abstract in the classroom takes on a practical dimension here: spectra become tools, and retention times become the basis for decision-making.
After summer, the group will move on to 12th grade; many of them are taking the advanced chemistry course. Their motivation to not just watch but to get hands-on is correspondingly high.
Julia is currently casting a critical eye over her reaction. Everything is going according to plan. Her path is clear: “I’d like to work in the natural sciences later on,” she says. She deliberately chose the internship during the summer holidays—as an opportunity to gain valuable experience and refine her own interests.
A week may seem short. But amid pipettes, reaction flasks, and measurement curves, something lasting takes shape: a sense of how research works—and perhaps the first firm step toward a future in science.
