The students: An understanding that Lund University is a university and not a research institute
Jack Senften, student representative in many university contexts, believes it is important that the new vice-chancellor have an understanding that Lund University is a university and not a research institute.
It is of vital importance to the students who the vice-chancellor is. It is the vice-chancellor who takes decisions on, for example, the student list of rights.
“And the list of rights is a really important document for us. It means that we know what our rights are when it comes to, for example, exams and coursework – that we can confidently find support in it.”
Jack Senften also believes it is important for a new vice-chancellor to be able to identify and take on the significant societal challenges.
“As we are affected by them.”
Jack Senften emphasises that the new vice-chancellor also needs to recognise the importance of listening to the students and not just the faculties.
“We would also like to have a vice-chancellor who shares our values. Such as fee-free education and collegial leadership.”
An absence of fees, says Jack Senften, was a fight that the students lost with regard to the international students.
“It is important that we do not tumble further down that slope”, he says.
Above all, as an area of development for the new vice-chancellor to tackle, Jack Senften nominates the teaching. The compulsory five weeks of training in teaching and learning in higher education for senior lecturers and professors, which corresponds to 7.5 credits, is not enough.
“It is laughable if you compare it to secondary school teachers who complete 60 credits in educational sciences. It is a delusion to assume that a good researcher is automatically a good teacher.”
Jack Senften hopes that a new vice-chancellor will work to extend the five compulsory weeks to ten.
Equally important are the growing mental health issues among young adults, which also applies to the students. Jack Senften says the students are ignored in the University’s systematic work environment management.
“It focuses on staff but there are actually approximately 40 000 students here each day as well.”
Given the demanding environment that the students live in, Jack Senften would like guidance and projects that focus on the students’ work environment.
