Start making sense is looking for a student assistant

Start Making Sense
is looking for a student assistant

About BOLD Cities & The Start Making Sense project
The Leiden-Delft-Erasmus (LDE) Centre for BOLD Cities researches the role of technology in urban
contexts. In 2025, the Centre launched the Start Making Sense project. Together with residents,
journalists, policymakers, and researchers, we are developing an open “camera register” for the city
of Rotterdam. This register makes visible where cameras are located, for what purpose they are
used, and what societal impacts they may have. We are also exploring how practices of
contestation may question and challenge the dominant imaginaries of urban surveillance while
also providing alternative imaginaries of urban technologies. We aim to examine how dominant
and alternative imaginaries converge, conflict, and interact, and how artistic practices can
contribute to this exploration.

Your Role as a Student Assistant
Conducting literature reviews on themes such as surveillance, urban security and co�creative &
counter-mapping.
Developing an intervention with artists to stimulate public dialogue about cameras in the city (e.g.,
a workshop, exhibition, movie, to be decided with the team).
Supporting and preparing knowledge exchange and valorization activities of the project; for
example, assisting with a data walk, helping organize events, or transcribing discussions.
Assisting in gathering and processing data, such as preparing and conducting interviews.

What We Offer
A unique opportunity to gain practical experience with counter-mapping practices and engaged
research within a transdisciplinary research project.
Compensation in accordance with the university’s guidelines (FlexDelft).
You will be associated with the Department of Urbanism (TU Delft) and have the opportunity to
collaborate with researchers from Erasmus University & Leiden University.

What We Ask
You are socially engaged and interested in urban technology, citizen participation, citizen science,
and artistic-academic collaborations.
You are interested in qualitative and participatory research.
You are a TU Delft student, preferably in the first year of a Master program.
You are available for about 6h/week from April until December 2026 to work on the project.
You are able to work regularly in Rotterdam (travel expenses will be reimbursed).
Are you interested in questions of urban surveillance and how they intersect with
broader socio-political discourses and narratives? We have the perfect student

assistantship position for you at the Centre for BOLD Cities!

To apply for this position, please send your CV and 1-page motivation letter to Arthur De
Jaeger dejaeger@essb.eur.nl and Juliana Goncalves j.e.goncalves@tudelft.nlwith the subject
“Student for the Start Making Sense Project”. We look forward to hearing from you!