At present, it is still uncertain how many study places will be affected by the reductions Aarhus University in general and the Faculty of Arts in particular will be required to make, but there is no doubt that the reduction will be significant. The new model does, however, contain some improvements in the form of a longer phasing-in period and greater flexibility.
Last Friday, the higher education minister presented new adjustments to the so-called dimensioning model which sets new upper limits for student admission to a number of AU's degree programmes – primarily at Arts.
The senior management team generally agrees with the government that university degree programmes need to undergo some kind of adjustment in light of the increasing intake and the employment situation. But it would have been preferable if the universities themselves had been allowed to make this adjustment in dialogue with the employers.
A new milestone in the process of improving the organisation, structure and processes at Aarhus University has been reached. On Wednesday 22 October, Rector Brian Bech Nielsen announced the decisions made by the senior management team. These decisions were made on the basis of a process in which employees and students have been deeply involved.
These decisions include both changes that will take effect immediately and, where solving problems will require the involvement of employees, the initiation of inclusive problem-solving processes.
On Saturday, 25 October AU researchers hosted the official inauguration of a new telescope on Mount Izaña on Tenerife.
The telescope is the first prototype in the effort to create a large network of a total of eight telescopes worldwide which will provide new knowledge about stellar oscillations and earth-like planets in our galaxy.
The new Stellar Observations Network Group (SONG) network will be headed by AU researchers from the Stellar Astrophysics Centre, a basic research centre, together with researchers from the University of Copenhagen.
The National Committee for Research Infrastructure has asked the universities to provide proposals for what to include in the updated roadmap for research infrastructure.
The faculties are being asked to map their need for new projects, research facilities or extensions of already realised projects. Based on this mapping, the Committee for Research and External Cooperation will decide which projects will continue.
School of Business and Social Sciences (BSS) has just received the official letter from EFMD’s Awarding Body stating that the school’s activities pertaining to the field of management and business studies (i.e. the Department of Business Administration, the Department of Business Communication and the Department of Economics and Business) have been granted EQUIS accreditation for the next three years.
BSS thus retains the international EQUIS and AACSB accreditations. The result of the ongoing AMBA accreditation process is expected later this year.
AU fell back one place and is now ranked no. 87 on this year's list from National Taiwan University, which was published on Friday 17 October.
Aarhus University holds a particularly high ranking in the fields of agriculture, clinical medicine and social sciences, all of which are ranked in the top 100.
Overall, AU has climbed 45 places since 2007, when the list was first published. The universities are ranked on the basis of such criteria as the number of scientific articles, the articles' impact factor and the number of citations.
The Senior Management Team publishes a newsletter every week. This newsletter includes a brief description of current activities and discussions. You can sign up for the Danish version of the newsletter at http://info.au.dk/medarbbreve, after which you will receive an e-mail whenever the newsletter is issued.
If you would like to subscribe to the English version of News from the Senior Management Team, please go to http://info.au.dk/medarbbreve/index.asp?sprog=en. The English version of News from the Senior Management Team is available at http://www.au.dk/en/about/uni/seniormanagement/newsletter/. You can read previous editions of News from the Senior Management Team at
http://www.au.dk/en/about/uni/seniormanagement/newsletter/2014.