The Prime Minister of Baden-Württemberg, Winfried Kretschmann, the President of the Grand Est region, Jean Rottner, and the Rectrice of the Académie de Strasbourg, Sophie Béjean, have expressed their firm intention to continue to develop Eucor – The European Campus into a European university by jointly signing the relevant declaration in the presence of Nathalie Loiseau, French Minister of European Affairs, and Theresia Bauer, the Baden-Württemberg Minister of Science, Research and the Arts.
The declaration follows on from the speech on European policy at the Sorbonne on 26th September 2017, by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, when he called for the formation of “European universities”. The signatories also affirm that the European model of the University must be distinguished by research and teaching being closely interlinked: “It must in fact take an approach with a comprehensive strategy that considers the fields of research and teaching equally. Only through a combination of both can true European added value be generated.” Eucor – The European Campus is the ideal embodiment of this model. In addition they stressed that only a “joint commitment by the universities, and at regional and national levels as well as from the European Union” can lead to success and affirm their willingness to act to create a “clear framework and reliable development promises at national and European levels”.
Background information about Eucor – The European Campus
The European Grouping of Territorial Cooperation (EGCT) Eucor – The European Campus developed out of a long-standing cooperation between the universities of the Upper Rhine region. In December 2015 the five member universities – the University of Basel, the University of Freiburg, the Université de Haute-Alsace, the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and the Université de Strasbourg – signed the founding document to establish a separate legal personality for cross-border research and teaching. With this, the universities created the first EGCT between universities at a European level. The European Campus places a particular focus on research in the areas of quantum physics and quantum technologies, precision medicine, sustainability studies and cultural studies. In 2016 the Eucor – The European Campus: cross-border structures project received three years of funding from the Interreg program of the European Union (European Regional Development Fund). The aim is to develop formative structures that create the basic conditions for new, ground-breaking and at the same time identity-defining cooperations in research and teaching.
Contact
Sarah Nieber
Press officer for Eucor – The European Campus
University of Freiburg
Phone: +49 761 203-4282
E-Mail: sarah.nieber(at)pr.uni-freiburg.de
