More professorships, more grants, more projects: With its growing success, the University of Oldenburg is reaching its spatial limits. Jörg Stahlmann, Vice President for Administration, talks about state regulations - and about solutions on campus.
QUESTION: Mr Stahlmann, the university lacks around 9,000 square metres of space - you have had this evaluated. Will academics soon have to hold their lectures outdoors?
STAHLMANN: No, it won't come to that. But the lack of space is already considerable. The cut-off date for our evaluation was 31 December 2013, and since then there have been new approvals. So the problem hasn't got any smaller.
QUESTION: Why is it that such a considerable space problem has arisen?
STAHLMANN: The growing success in acquiring third-party funding, additional professorships, for example in biology and physics or as part of the cluster of excellence approval. But also in the sharp rise in student numbers - just three aspects that show how successfully the university has developed in recent years. When projects are approved, this usually also means that people are hired. And that in turn means that jobs have to be created. Just take the new junior research groups, the new doctoral programmes at the university or special education. As part of the expansion of special needs education, nine new professorships will be added over the next three years starting in the winter semester. And the shortage of space at our natural sciences campus in Wechloy will not diminish - despite the new research buildings such as NeSSy and Windlab that were planned years ago.
QUESTION: It was not possible to anticipate the successes in terms of long-term space and construction planning?
STAHLMANN: As a state organisation, we are in a bit of a dilemma here. Because we don't own the buildings. Forward-looking acquisition of land and premises, forward-looking planning, building and also renting is very difficult due to the legal requirements of the state. Basically, you first have to be successful in order to be able to draw up the corresponding concrete room allocation plans - only then do you have any chance at all of registering a construction project for the budget or obtaining authorisation to rent.
QUESTION: That means that the people who need offices are actually already there before there is a new building plan?
STAHLMANN: That's right. The university's medium-term construction plan does exist. In it, we show the state what the space requirements are in the long term. But the state will only take action if we can demonstrate the actual need. This is only possible once third-party funding has actually been acquired, for example. And the process that then begins is slow: it takes at least five to six years from determining the need to the realisation of a building - from the entire budget planning process to construction and commissioning. In addition, the state is currently focussing on necessary renovation measures in order to maintain the structural substance of the university buildings. This means that the financial resources for new buildings are very limited.
QUESTION: Can the university also finance building projects itself - regardless of specific allocations from the state?
STAHLMANN: That is a possibility, and we utilise it where we can: The extension of a wing of a building in Wechloy or the laboratory containers for medicine, for example, were financed by the university. But the procedure described also applies to such self-financed projects - as it does for all construction measures.
QUESTION: In your view, what other solutions are there?
STAHLMANN: We are currently organising a lot through additional rentals. However, it is fundamentally important for us to streamline the formal procedures for buildings and leases so that we can plan for the long term and, above all, act more quickly. This is exactly what we are discussing with the other universities in Lower Saxony, which are in a similar position - with the exception of the foundation universities, which are legally authorised to act as building owners themselves. A certain amount of solidarity with one another is now essential on campus: perhaps there are rooms that are not currently being used and can be given away - temporarily? For example, the university library has made some of its rooms in Wechloy available to accommodate biology lecturers.
QUESTION: The Division for Building Management has a lot to do ...
STAHLMANN: Exactly. Head of Department Meik Möllers is holding talks with all the institutions for further space planning - where will space become available, which spaces can be sensibly allocated to which Schools? A highly complex puzzle. But the entire team in the Division is doing an excellent job. And Meik Möllers is very well networked; his personal contacts in the State Construction Management Department and the Ministry are worth their weight in gold when it comes to clarifying things in an uncomplicated manner.
