Aarhus University's senior management team invites all staff and students to a general meeting to be held at the Main Hall between 10:00 and 11.30 on 2 May. The senior management team will be presenting its plans for the physical development of the university, and you can ask questions and contribute input. Registration is not required. The event will also be live-streamed at au.dk/campusliv
A tribute to the role of science in society took place on Sunday 22 April at the worldwide March for Science event. It took place at Bispetorv in Aarhus, and Dean Lars Bo Nielsen of Aarhus University gave a speech at the opening ceremony. He invited everyone to celebrate research and its role in our world and day-to-day lives.
This is the second year in a row in which the March for Science has been held in Denmark, accompanied by a similar event in Copenhagen. Demonstrations are being held in cities all around the world.
The senior management team has initiated an investigation of freedom of research at Aarhus University, and a steering committee consisting of four chairs of the academic councils and joint union representatives for academic staff is responsible for carrying out the investigation ahead of the academic council seminar to be held in the autumn of 2018.
In a feature article published in the newspaper Børsen on 20 April, Rector Brian Bech Nielsen, along with Anders Kühnau, chairman of the Central Denmark Regional Council, and Uffe Jensen, mayor of Odder, submitted a new proposal from Forenklingsudvalget for Erhvervsfremme, the Simplification Committee for Business Promotion.
The three writers express concerns about the committee's proposal to replace the democratically elected regional and regionally established growth fora with a single state board with five subordinate ‘erhvervshuse’ (business development centres). They believe that not only will this increase the risk of important local strengths being overlooked in business promotion efforts, but also that it will remove the foundation for a number of broad, regionally established partnerships that have demonstrated a unique ability to produce results.
Conciliator Mette Christiansen made a decision on the night of 17 April to postpone the strike and lockout for up to two weeks. Unless the negotiating parties reach a compromise – or an impasse – before the end of the two-week period, the strike will begin on 6 May and the lockout will begin on 12 May.
In addition, the Ministry of Finance concluded an agreement with unions under Danish Confederation of Professional Associations on 10 April to exempt employees posted abroad from the conflict.
Søren Riis Paludan, professor at the Department of Biomedicine at Aarhus University, has received an ERC Advanced Grant of DKK 18.7 million from the European Research Council (ERC). This major grant will make it possible for Søren Riis Paludan to launch major new and ambitious basic research projects focusing on new immunological mechanisms.
Pop into Stakladen on 26 April to see your colleagues' research presented at the Festival of Research. The event is open to all. If you would like to know more but are unable to attend, you can follow the event on the AU Facebook page.
The senior management team publishes a weekly newsletter Here, we provide information about decisions and initiatives from the senior management team, as well as current activities and discussions. You can register for the newsletter at http://info.au.dk/medarbbreve, and you will then receive an email every time the newsletter is published.
You will find previous newsletters from the senior management team at http://www.au.dk/om/uni/universitetsledelsen/nyhedsbrevuniled/2017.
If you would like to register for the English version of the news from the senior management team, you can do so at http://info.au.dk/medarbbreve/index.asp