Presidium bids farewell to Vice President Prof. Nathalie Singer

Professor Speitkamp thanked Professor Singer for her commitment during her three years in office. The »tremendous enthusiasm« with which she always approached tasks and her »practical wisdom« allowed her to greatly enrich the work of the Presidium and consistently make constructive contributions. Professor Speitkamp highlighted how their cooperation also benefited greatly from her pragmatic view of teaching and the faculties, shaped by her extensive experience.

Professor Singer, who chairs the Professorship for Experimental Radio within the Faculty of Art and Design, assumed the role of Vice President for Academic Affairs in April 2017. During her term in office, she above all devoted herself to developing studies and teaching further and to raising greater awareness for issues of equal opportunity, diversity and participation at the university.

She consistently sought to break down boundaries between the individual disciplines and introduced entirely new formats to this end. These include the university-wide »Tag der Lehre« held every year in May, which focuses on new methodologies, approaches to teaching and tools. Professor Singer was also instrumental in design and management of the Bauhaus.Semester forming the core of the activities marking the Bauhaus anniversary year at the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar. Due to the great success of the often experimental teaching formats piloted during this period, the interdisciplinary character of the Bauhaus.Semester is to be continued with the Bauhaus.Modules. Professor Singer has also furthered the development of a special interdisciplinary Bauhaus study programme.

In her function as Vice President, Professor Singer felt particularly strongly about the internal communication culture both between university management and the faculties and across the entire university as well as the participation of all status groups. Through her work, she was able to better position aspects such as diversity and equal opportunity, which were previously perceived more as peripheral issues, as central tasks of the university and to establish anti-discrimination guidelines. In 2019, the university moreover successfully secured funding from the »Programme for Women Professors III« of the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF).

During the Senate session, Professor Singer thanked the Presidium for the trusting and constructive cooperation. She added that she will now devote herself to her tasks within the Professorship for Experimental Radio with a »new view of the university« and continue to work to ensure that the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar »remains an organism that lives from trust and community«.