Ceremonial Transfer of Office: Middendorf succeeds Ressel as Rector

One day after the official inauguration of the new Rector, Peter Middendorf, and the formation of the new Rectorate, his predecessor, Wolfram Ressel, ceremoniously handed over the chain of office.

Before the ceremony, all those present held a minute's silence in memory of Prof. Stephan Dabbert, Rector of the University of Hohenheim, who died unexpectedly. Petra Olschowski, Minister of Science, Research and the Arts Baden-Württemberg, honoured his achievements in a short speech.

Prof Bernhard Keimer, the long-standing Chair of the University Council, welcomed the guests, who attended the event in two lecture theatres and via online livestream, and served as host for the evening. In her welcoming address, Minister Petra Olschowski emphasised as a strong sign that the former Rector Ressel and the former Vice-Rector for Knowledge and Technology Transfer Middendorf had already jointly contributed to the success of many projects, such as ARENA2036 and the ICM. The Mayor of the state capital of Stuttgart, Dr. Frank Nopper, who also referred to the differences between Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg in a humorous speech, is looking forward to continuity and new impulses from the new Rector for the science city of Stuttgart.

Prof. Ulrich Rüdiger, Rector of RWTH Aachen University, praised Ressel, after 18 years in office ‘a veteran of the rectorate’, as a special, fair, calm, authoritative, appreciative personality with a great deal of expertise, who always took on responsibility without putting himself in the foreground and exploiting it for his own purposes. Ressel had shown that competition, collegiality and friendship were possible at the same time.

International greetings from Bergamo, Michigan, Massachusetts, Stellenbosch, Shanghai and Sydney were conveyed in a video message. With a spontaneous performance and a 'Sessel (armchair) for Ressel’ on the Campus Beach, the student representation stuvus thanked Ressel for the good cooperation.

The outgoing Rector gave his speech under the title ‘18 years: farewell and thanks’. His first term of office was all about consolidation and continuity for a divided university, while the second saw the growth of the "Stuttgart way", in which strong disciplines can work together to achieve insights that individuals could never achieve individually. “That has become our DNA here  - and quite successfully,“ said Ressel. The emerging competition for funding has become increasingly intense and now, after his third term in office, the university is well positioned for the future with its two Clusters of Excellence, six of its own Collaborative Research Centres and numerous successful projects as well as its commitment in the area of transfer. He wished Middendorf every success for his term of office.

After his predecessor had put the chain of office on him, Middendorf emphasised the role of the university in turbulent times in his speech: “We are currently in a phase of transformation. This transformation has many different dimensions: digitization, demographic change, energy transition or decarbonization – to name just the most important – and presents us with numerous challenges. Our university is right in the middle of this development and is therefore also facing numerous challenges. At the same time, however, universities and colleges are clearly part of the solution.”

During his term of office, Middendorf would like to strengthen the "Stuttgart Way", research in networked disciplines, and further establish the university as a partner in the transfer of knowledge in a “start-up ecosystem” with stakeholders from business, society, the city and the region. According to Middendorf, the focus is always on people: in addition to researchers and employees, particularly the students, who are “the innovators of the future and the shapers of our world of tomorrow”. He therefore also sees improving study conditions and modernizing curricula as important tasks during his term of office.