At its meeting on the 26 February, the board decided to initiate the process of finding a successor for university director Jørgen Jørgensen.
The senior management team wishes to have a new university director in place well before the budget for 2015 is completed. Both the rector and the board are keen to ensure the best possible conditions for a smooth handover from the current to the coming university director.
On 15 February, Professor Karl Anker Jørgensen was appointed acting head of the Department of Chemistry. He is replacing Ib Johannsen, who is continuing as associate professor at the Department of Engineering where, among other things, he will focus on his task as competence centre leader in the Biovalue SPIR platform.
The agreement between the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Fisheries of Denmark and Aarhus University on research-based public sector consultancy has just been extended and will now applies for 2014 and four years hence. The content of the agreement is negotiated once a year in close dialogue between the ministry and AU. The agreement is divided into 13 theme areas. The agreement between the Danish Centre for Food and Agriculture (DCA) and the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Fisheries of Denmark involves DCA receiving DKK 280.2 million in 2014, falling to DKK 263.1 million in 2017. In 2013, the agreement totalled DKK 285.8 million.
AU's public sector consultancy for the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Fisheries of Denmark is coordinated by the Danish Centre for Food and Agriculture (DCA), where a number of institutes contribute research and consultancy. In addition to public sector consultancy for the ministry, DCA is obliged to contribute to the transfer of knowledge and technology to businesses, authorities and other relevant stakeholders.
This year, the Aarhus University Research Foundation is granting DKK 16 million to the PhD degree programmes at the four main academic areas. The grant will fund scholar fellowships, which have been awarded every year since 2006.
The fellowships will be supplemented by an extra grant for the graduate schools of DKK 3 million, which can be used to finance stays by foreign PhD students at Aarhus University.
The connection between the choice of study programme and job prospects was one of the main themes at this year's U-days event at Aarhus University.
This year, potential students had the possibility of meeting qualified graduates from various study programmes as well as teachers, supervisors and current students.
The study programmes at Aarhus University held open-house events on Thursday and Friday, while the actual education fair took place on Saturday.
The programmes in Emdrup had an open-house event earlier last week, while AU Herning is opening its doors on 8 March.
In 2013, 8,000 prospective students visited the open-day event, which this year comprises a total of 145 higher education degree programmes.
2013 saw a stabilisation in the total number of students enrolled at Aarhus University according to the statistics which were published by Universities Denmark.
The statistics show that Aarhus University had a total of 38,169 students enrolled on its Bachelor's and Master's degree programmes in 2013. This figure grew by an average of 7 per cent a year in the 2009-2012 period, while between 2012 and 2013 it dropped 1.4 per cent. Generally, the growth in the number of enrolled students at Aarhus University has been slightly less than the average for the sector relative to the entire 2009-2013 period.
While 2013 saw a small increase in the number of new undergraduate students, the number of students enrolled on the Master's degree programmes increased by 26 per cent. Last year, Aarhus University admitted a total of 5,780 new Master's degree students. The increase is primarily attributable to the large admission of Bachelor's degree students which the university sector saw in 2009 and 2010.
Universities Denmark's statistics are published every year and comprise two phases: The study figures are published in February, while the figures for PhD programmes, staff and finance are published in June.
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.