Four new members were elected to the AU Board in the recent university elections.
The four newly elected members will join the AU Board on 1 February 2020. In total, five internal members sit on the board, all elected by university students and staff. Ditte Marie Thomsen, the second of the two student representatives on the board, is not up for election until next time.
The university thanks everyone who participated in the election.
In relation to the riots in Hong Kong, AU has spoken to all 33 students studying at a university in the city this semester. The majority of the students have either decided to stay on in Hong Kong or to travel to other countries in the region. So far, five AU students have returned to Denmark.
Regardless of whether the students choose to stay or return home, AU will find a satisfactory solution for each of them, so that they can earn the ECTS credits they are counting on from their study abroad.
The International Centre is in dialogue with the students who were planning a spring stay in Hong Kong in 2020 in order to find good alternatives. Things are looking promising, and five out of six students have already been offered and accepted new exchange destinations.
Aarhus University will continue to monitor the situation closely.
Last week, the EU adopted its budget for 2020, and more funding will be allocated to both the Horizon and Erasmus programmes next year. The research and innovation pools in Horizon 2020 will therefore be awarding EUR 13.5 billion; 9 per cent more than in 2019, while the budget for the Erasmus+ programme is increasing by almost 4 per cent to EUR 2.89 billion.
Climate change, youth, the labour market and security are again among the top priorities for the European Community, which has a total budget of DKK 153 billion in 2020.
The EU works with a seven-year budget framework, and 2020 is the last year of the current framework. Therefore, during 2020 a new general framework for the years up to 2027 will be established. In the field of research, this means that EU institutions will have to negotiate budgets in more detail for the Horizon Europe research programme, which will replace Horizon 2020.
Eleven AU researchers have been selected to become Sapere Aude research directors by the Independent Research Fund Denmark. The award is given to the very best early career researchers, with an emphasis on ground-breaking ideas and leadership ambitions. The eleven recipients from Aarhus University have received a total of DKK 66 million.
At national level, the Independent Research Fund Denmark appointed 35 research directors, who have received a total of DKK 208 million.
Applications are now being accepted for 15 AIAS-COFUND fellowships for international researchers and up to four Jens Christian Skou Fellowships for AU researchers. The deadline is 17 January and 31 January 2020, respectively.
AU's cross-disciplinary case competition – the AU Challenge – has been decided. On Friday 17 November, three teams, each with their own business case, won the AU Challenge after the final day of competition.
A total of 34 interdisciplinary teams signed up for the competition, and the City of Aarhus, VisitDenmark and Hedeselskabet were responsible for the three cases. The theme was sustainability, and the solutions included running tourism, recycling soft plastics and textiles made from wood fibre.
The students on the winning teams will now be helping the organisations to put their solutions into practice. For the second year in succession, the AU Challenge has demonstrated that it can help strengthen students' competences and relations with the business community, with benefits for all parties.