Elections for the Senate 2024

In the Hesse 2024 collective bargaining round, we actively and successfully campaigned for more permanent positions at university. The problem of precarious employment relationships at the university is on the political agenda. At the same time, from a Marburg perspective (according to the guideline for fixed-term employment), the amendment of the WissZeitVG does nothing to improve key problems in the academic career path. It remains to be seen how the critical 4+2 model can be implemented in the post-doc period and translated into permanent contracts. In addition, there are still short contract periods that hardly do justice to the duration of a doctorate (on average 5.7 years excluding medicine/health sciences). We want to play an active role in shaping the implementation of the new legal and political requirements at our university. But that is not enough: we still need more – and plannable! – career paths alongside the professorship. That is why we want to continue working on making employment in academia more attractive and secure. We are campaigning for more permanent positions in research and teaching and for automatic extensions of fixed-term contracts (CARE commitments). To this end, we plan to enter an exchange with other Hessian universities in order to discuss alternative personnel models and departmental structures and to develop concrete models for better employment conditions. It is also important to us to enable the large group of academic staff in qualification periods to participate in committees. The representation of their own interests must not be made structurally more difficult! We therefore want to work towards the introduction of time-based compensation models.

Not only the supervision and assessment of the doctoral thesis are in one hand, but also the employment relationship of doctoral candidates who work as academic staff. We are committed to easing this dense dependency relationship – by establishing external assessment structures that enable an independent view of doctoral projects, but also by discussing alternative personnel models and department structures. To enable successful doctorates within an appropriate time frame, the dependency structures and task profiles at the university must be critically scrutinized and employment, supervision and assessment relationships must be rethought. We are committed to this project.

During our last term of office, we began working with the doctoral candidate’s representatives to standardize the status group assignment for doctoral candidates. To this end, a working group called „AG Statusgruppe“ was founded within the doctoral candidate’s representation and contact was established with other universities and doctoral candidate’s representations in order to exchange information on their successful implementation. This process is to be continued to achieve this goal at the University of Marburg as well and thus enable democratic representation in the committees for all doctoral candidates alike. Until then, we as the Senate List want to continue to offer all doctoral candidates the opportunity to participate in our work.

The most important committees at Philipps-Universität only work in German. International students and academics who do not speak German currently have no opportunity to get involved in university politics. This must change! We are also committed to ensuring that all important information is at least available in English translation. This concerns all parts of the university website, guidelines and other documents.

According to experience reports, the onboarding of new employees takes place in very different ways in the individual work units of the university. From a systematic introduction to the structures of the university and their own working environment to new colleagues being left almost completely to their own devices, everything is possible. We are committed to introducing standards for onboarding to make it easier for new colleagues to get started and integrate quickly. This must include familiarization with teaching at university. Good induction creates a welcoming culture and can contribute to a stronger identification with the university.

We support the encouragement of dedication in (digital) teaching and advocate better supervision ratios in the seminars. Teamwork should be encouraged and spaces for reflection on teaching should be firmly anchored in the university. Beginning lecturers should be better supported, e.g. through the creation of guidelines for different teaching scenarios, through workshops that are offered especially for them in the planning phase of their seminars at the end of September/beginning of October, as well as through coaching that is tailored to their needs and accompanies their first seminar. Attending university didactics courses must be recognized as working time and should also be supported by supervisors. High-quality teaching takes time – and this must be factored in!

Combining an academic career and family work is still a major challenge today. In our experience, support structures and employment contract conditions do not yet match the current realities of life for employees with children or employees who care for relatives. We are committed to continuously improving the compatibility of academic career planning and family work and examine the impact of any statutes and regulations on compatibility issues. In order to achieve this, we want to advocate, among other things, that the contract term is automatically extended by 2 years per child if one or more children under the age of 18 are being cared for (see WissZeitVG § 2 para. 1).

The situation for cyclists at Philipps-Universität, especially on the Lahnberge, is miserable. Too few or outdated parking facilities, non-existent changing rooms with washing facilities and the abolition of the bicycle bus make commuting by bike to the Lahnberge unattractive for many colleagues. We are therefore campaigning for the expansion of bicycle mobility at the university and are calling for better infrastructure for cycling colleagues and students! This includes modern and sufficient parking spaces for bicycles  in front of all university buildings, a safe network of cycle paths through the city and up the Lahnberge, washing and changing facilities at the workplace, a reintroduction of the bicycle bus and uncomplicated financial support for the purchase of bicycles used for business purposes.

Digital teaching must be developed further, complement, and expand face-to-face courses in a meaningful way – also in international exchange. Digital formats offer a great deal of flexibility, especially for lecturers and students with CARE commitments and students who have to work alongside their studies. To achieve this, the university must continue to expand its infrastructure. It needs suitable rooms with conference systems, digital platforms for collaborative work, further training opportunities for staff and appropriate recognition of digital teaching achievements and efforts. In addition, common administrative processes that currently require an unnecessary amount of time (such as applying for leave or business trips) need to be implemented digitally everywhere.

The work of the Senate and the various other committees is important for the development of Philipps-Universität, for working conditions and the framework conditions for research and teaching. In our view, however, there is a lack of exchange between the representatives on these committees and the employees in the departments and institutions. In the Senate, we are committed to transparent and open university policy and would like to lead by example. We therefore invite all employees to find out about our work in the Senate, discuss the issues at hand and contribute their own ideas.