Partnerships
The WODC maintains good contacts with relevant research institutes in the Netherlands and key researchers in the field of justice and security. The WODC also participates in committees and working groups. Two important partnerships of which the WODC is part are NeuroLabNL and CIROC.
NeuroLabNL
NeuroLabNL is the academic workplace for brain, cognitive and behavioural research. People from universities, universities of applied sciences, knowledge institutes and civil society organizations collaborate in research about brains, cognition and behaviour. NeuroLabNL is one of the 25 routes of the Dutch National Research Agenda (in Dutch: Nationale Wetenschapsagenda - NWA).
In 2017, the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science gave eight NWA routes the opportunity of setting up research through Start Impulse. The NeuroLabNL route received a start impulse for research into the optimal learning conditions for young people. Within NeuroLabNL, a consortium was formed between universities, universities of applied sciences, applied research organizations and civil society organizations to apply the knowledge from cognitive neurosciences in practice.
Katy de Kogel (personal page in Dutch), from the WODC is involved in the NeuroLabNL route as senior researcher. Together with Prof. Eveline Crone, professor at Leiden University, she is coordinating the Optimal Learning Conditions and Safety for Young People research programme. This programme runs from 2018 to 2020 inclusive and consists of four research themes.
The first project concerns the brain and the behavioural development of young people with problem antisocial behaviour. The second project concerns physiological wearables; the field of application being young people whose behaviour is antisocial.
CIROC
CIROC was founded in 2001; it is the Centre for Information and Research on Organised Crime. It is an international centre for information focussing specifically on organized crime and the fight against it. Initiative-takers on the foundation of the institute are the WODC and the criminology sections of Erasmus University Rotterdam and VU Amsterdam.
Foreign experts from the research community, journalism, detection and prosecution can remain abreast of significant developments through CIROC's activities. CIROC opens up research, police analyses and literature. This allows information about organized crime and the fight against it, in Russia, Columbia, Albania and Italy for example, to be available to Dutch target groups. The Netherlands itself also has a significant position in the international world of organized crime.
CIROC publishes a newsletter and regularly organizes seminars (four or five times a year) for both researchers and professionals from detection and prosecution.