Mon, 25 Jun 2007

Witten-Herdecke private university saved from takeover

By Cornelie Unger-Leistner

WITTEN/HERDECKE (NNA) – Witten-Herdecke university, which has been struggling with financial problems, has found an alternative to being taken over by a financially strong partner.

The private university will operate on an endowment fund model along the lines of private universities in the English-speaking world like Harvard, the governing board of directors of the university has decided.

The board of directors sees the new organisational structure as the “best way to develop the university in the tradition of its founders and in line with its successes so far,” the university said in a statement.

This solution has become possible through the financial commitment of a Duesseldorf family of entrepreneurs, the owners of the Droege International Group, who have secured the future of the first German private university with an endowment of 12 million euros. The members of the board of directors also transferred their shareholdings to the new UWH Foundation, which has thus become the sole owner of the university.

The commitment of the Droege International Group means that the long struggle for a stable financial model for the university has finally led to success, university President Dr. Wolfgang Glatthaar emphasised. The university for its part would now speedily implement the planned restructuring measures.

The money required to guarantee the continued operation of the university for the next five years is about 20 million euros, the university said. The Droege International Group endowment had covered more than half of this amount.

Others had already shown an interest in making up the rest, university press spokesman Dirk Hans told NNA. There was optimism that the next five years could be used to consolidate the position of the university.

According to the press office, the endowment capital currently lies at about 30 million euros. The long-term aim is to raise that to 100 to 200 million. “Traditional private universities such as Harvard have had 250 years to achieve that,” Hans said.

Costs will be saved through the planned restructuring measures. At the same time there will be a drive to increase student numbers. There are currently 1200 students at Witten-Herdecke.

Dr. Hedda im Brahm-Droege, co-owner of the Droege International Group, said the reason for the endowment was the innovative approach and performance of the university. “We want to support an innovative and forward-looking university model which enables students to develop themselves alongside the acquisition of subject qualifications,” she said.

Before the Droege International Group stepped in, the university had been in talks, among others, with the SRH health group based in Heidelberg. Critics had feared that a takeover by the group might have put an end to the university’s innovative approach.

The academic achievement of the university was recently proved by the Witten-Herdecke medical students themselves: they came out top among all 36 German medical faculties in the second part of the German national written medical examinations.

NNA/end/ung/cva

Item: 070625-02EN Date: 25 June 2007

More NNA reports at: www.nna-news.org/en/

Cultural centre planned for Canaries

By Cornelie Unger-Leistner

PUERTO DEL CARMEN/LANZAROTE (NNA) – By redeveloping the Waldorf kindergarten, which was started in 2000, and with a new cultural centre, the anthroposophical initiative on Lanzarote in the Canaries aims to bring its cultural impulse closer to the Spanish population, the Fundación Canaria Antroposófica announced in its newsletter.

The foundation is currently looking for land to lease. A first design for the “Centro Waldorf” on Lanzarote has been prepared by the Hamburg team of architects Gerd Rückner/G2R. The “Centro Waldorf” aims to offer cultural events with a special emphasis on education, but also intends to deal with contemporary and social issues.

It will be a “purly Spanish matter”, the founder and president of the Fundación, Enrique Winzer, told NNA. The project was being supported by Spanish anthroposophists in Madrid. The foundation hopes to have achieved concrete results by the autumn with regard to the building land.

A financing concept is currently being drawn up and fund-raising has already started. The first 10,000 euros have already been donated.

There has been a Waldorf kindergarten in Tahiche on Lanzarote since in rented accommodation 2000. It consists of three groups with 25 children, most of whom are Spanish, with only a few from German and English residents.

The Fundación Canaria Anthroposófica was established in 1985 by Lilo and Enrique Winzer. It comprises several facilities including a Finca growing bio-dynamic produce and the Centro de Terapia in Puerto del Carmen, established in the mid-1990s. Few Spanish guests visited the Centro, the Fundación writes in its newsletter. That was true of the organic shop, the restaurant and the therapy centre. As a result, the Centro had remained a “German-speaking enclave” and the foundation needed to do something about that.

On Lanzarote, too, the churches were growing empty and people experienced a “spiritual vacuum”. Eastern esoteric streams tried to fill the gap and there was hardly a movement which was not represented on the island. This was one of the reasons for developing the Centro Waldorf.

It was not an easy matter to persuade the inhabitants of the Canaries of the benefits of Waldorf education, as the experience with the kindergarten had shown. But after an initial phase, the reluctance “mostly turns into enthusiasm” the Fundación writes. On Lanzarote, Enrique Winzer hopes, the kindergarten will one day grow into a school.

Item: 070625-01EN Date: 25 June 2007

More NNA reports at: www.nna-news.org/en/

﻿Witten-Herdecke private university saved from takeover

﻿Cultural centre planned for Canaries

Witten-Herdecke private university saved from takeover

Cultural centre planned for Canaries