Michaela Wenner

Geophysicist, appointee website maintenance Girls on Ice Switzerland

Pronouns: she/her/hers

As opposed to most team members here, my love for nature and mountains actually started in my late teens. Sure, I went skiing in Austria with my parents each winter from a young age, but skiing down a slope in a ski resort is not really what I would consider spending time in nature.

So actually, I started “studying the earth” before falling in love with it. Right after highschool, I didn’t really know what to do with my life, but I liked geography, math and physics, so I thought, why not combine it and study Geophysics? Hence, I started my undergraduate in Geosciences in Munich.

Little did I know what Geophysics actually meant and that it has not much to do with geography. Of course, even while specializing in geophysics, we still had to take a few geology courses, and it wouldn’t be geology without field trips. So on my first field trip to Austria I remember being almost afraid of all the hiking, small mountain streams and snow fields. But the exposure to nature is in the end what developed my love for nature. 

After finishing my Bachelors in Munich, I decided to continue in Geophysics and started my Masters studies in Munich and Paris. Even though I consider Paris as one of the most awesome places I have ever been to, I realized that I did miss nature quite a lot. Luckily, I got the opportunity to start a PhD at ETH Zurich, Switzerland. On top of that, being a member of ETH’s glaciology group, opens a lot of opportunities for (work related) trips to the mountains. I became aware of Girls on Ice through my professor and immediately fell in love with the project. Since then, I have tried to help out where needed, and recently took over the task of maintaining the website content of Girls on Ice Switzerland up to date.  

Especially because I have experienced first-hand how important it is to be in nature to learn to love nature, I find Girls on Ice an incredibly important program.

Appointee website maintenance Girls* on Ice Switzerland