Office
Executive Leadership Team
Mervin Bakker
Mervin Bakker has been working in international education for 25 years. Immediately before joining the EAIE as Executive Director, he was Director International Strategy and Relations at the University of Groningen. Earlier in his career, Mervin was Regional Director at Nuffic’s Netherlands Education Support Offices in South Africa and Indonesia. Prior to this, Mervin worked at the University of Amsterdam as Manager International Programmes and as Head of Marketing & Communications for the Faculty of Economics and Business. He has also worked for an education agent in Thailand and ran a student related business in the Netherlands. Mervin holds an MSc in International Economics and Economic Geography from Utrecht University, and an MBA in Higher Education Management from the Institute of Education in London.
Knowledge Development Team
Laura E. Rumbley
Author, editor and educator with a passion for telling the full and complex ‘story’ of international higher education.
Laura is Director for Knowledge Development and Research at the EAIE. Before joining the EAIE, she was Associate Director of the Boston College Center for International Higher Education. She completed her undergraduate studies at Georgetown University, her Master’s degree at the School for International Training (SIT) Graduate Institute and her Doctorate degree at Boston College, studying as well at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid and the Universidad de Sevilla in Spain. Laura began her career in international education as an administrator and international student adviser at Boston University, subsequently becoming involved in international and comparative higher education, including an appointment as deputy director of the Academic Cooperation Association (ACA) in Brussels. Laura has co-authored and co-edited a number of publications, including the foundational document for the 2009 UNESCO World Conference on Higher Education Trends in Global Higher Education: Tracking an Academic Revolution; the International Briefs for Higher Education Leaders series; and several books, chapters and articles focused on internationalisation and comparative perspectives on subjects affecting the academic profession and universities worldwide.
Jody Hoekstra-Selten
Jody Hoekstra-Selten is Knowledge Development Officer at the EAIE. After obtaining a Master’s degree in Western Literature and Culture and a Research Master’s degree in Literary Studies, both at Utrecht University (NL), she has been working within the field of (international) education policy since 2012. Starting out as Policy Advisor Higher Education at the NRTO (the Dutch Council for Training and Education), she also spent eight years at the British Council in various roles, including Exams Operations Manager and Head of Education for the Netherlands.
Programme & Learning Team
Nicole Kaijser
Nicole Kaijser serves as Manager of Learning and Programme at the EAIE overseeing and designing all online and in-person learning activities for the association. Passionate about learning design, she trains and provides instructional design support for all contributors to the training programmes, webinars and Annual Conferences and is always on the hunt for the newest participant engagement methods.
In her spare time she also volunteers as an elected member of the Associations and Conferences Forum (AC Forum) Board in the capacity of Education Officer, organising all educational activities, workshops and the Annual Meeting programme as Chair of the Education Group. Nicole has worked in various event and programme capacities for higher education institutions in the UK.
