(Vienna/Klagenfurt, 11 December 2023/APA) - Rector Markus Müller was elected Vice-President of the Universities Conference (uniko) on Monday together with the Rector of the University of Art and Design Linz, Brigitte Hütter. The new President is the Rector of the University of Klagenfurt, Oliver Vitouch.
In future, the other members of the Executive Board will be Horst Bischof (Graz University of Technology), Peter Riedler (University of Graz), Sebastian Schütze (University of Vienna), Ulrike Sych (University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna) and Wolfgang Fleischhacker (Medical University of Innsbruck, co-opted). The term of office of the newly elected Executive Board begins on January 1 and runs until December 31, 2025.
Vitouch has already chaired uniko several times. In 2016, he was elected to the top position after Sonja Hammerschmid became Minister of Education immediately after beginning her term as uniko President. In 2019, he took over the leadership on an interim basis when Eva Blimlinger was initially not re-elected as Rector and subsequently entered the National Council election campaign for the Greens.
On the occasion of his election, Vitouch was optimistic about the future. The university budget for 2025-2027 with a total sum of 16 billion euros will "enable good development" despite the current high inflation, he said in a press release. "We want to build on our recent successes, from Nobel Prizes to ERC grants, and make Austria one of Europe's leading research nations. At the same time, producing key employees, i.e. our graduates, will become increasingly important in view of demographic change." In view of global challenges ranging from artificial intelligence to climate change and from healthcare to humanitarian development, there is "more than enough to do".
APA (aku/riß)