Opening Week 2020: "A special place and a special time"
2020-10-01 Leuphana's unique study model requires all 1400 first-year students to deal intensively with a socially relevant topic at the beginning of their studies. This year's theme is "Future::Cities". Due to the Corona Pandemic, the opening ceremony was broadcast live to all students from the central building. Prominent initiators from politics and business sent welcoming words.
"Read many books! Reflect on how you want the world to be," democracy researcher Ulrike Guérot encouraged the first-semester students. The professor of the Department for European Policy and the Study of Democracy (DED) at Danube University Krems addressed the aftermath of Corona in her words: "Do it also because you probably have to - or are allowed to - build a new world after the pandemic." This could be a brave new other world, beyond neoliberalism, ecological, climate friendly and anti-racist.
The corona pandemic did not only mark the first address of the opening ceremony: This year's Opening Week at Leuphana combines consistent health protection with new creative opportunities. With the words "a special place and a special time", Christian Brei, full-time Vice-President, welcomed the first-year students. They did not experience this year's Opening Ceremony on site in the Libeskind Auditorium of the central building, but in front of their computer screens. The new students work on campus in groups of up to 15 participants and a tutor. Each project group has access to a seminar room, in which the prescribed distances must be observed. There, students discuss how cities can become places of a future worth living in. Leuphana has invited initiators from the sciences, business and politics to participate. University President Sascha Spoun wished the first-semester students an "exciting academic experience".
Christian Brei interviewed the CDU politician Diana Kinnert on digitality and presence. The entrepreneur owns an innovation agency for green start-ups, among other things, and was involved in setting up the British anti-loneliness ministry. "Loneliness is a major problem in Western civilisation," said the activist. She referred to a fragmented society, to very old people who are largely excluded from digital communication, and a flexibility regime that promotes loneliness. For this reason, especially in connection with the fight against climate change, the politician called for "smart alliances" between the generations to overcome the crisis together. She called on first semester students to participate in society: "I wish young people to grow up faster and understand more quickly that they can start an argument with self-confidence". The two AStA spokespersons Julia Klindworth and Ali Simsek also encouraged the first semester students to get involved in society: "We have many initiatives. Get involved!"
In his speech, the Mayor of Lüneburg, Ulrich Mädge, emphasised the importance of the Libeskind Building: "The new central building is an important symbol of the city's transformation from a former garrison town to a university town”. He underlined the good cooperation between city and university, highlighting as an example the research project "Zukunftsstadt 2030+", funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research with around 1.5 million Euros. Lüneburg is one of eight future cities nationwide. Ideas for a more sustainable life in the city are tested in real-world laboratories.
The Opening Week ends on 9 October. Among other guest speakers in addition to Ranga Yogeshwar are urban sociologist Saskia Sassen from New York, the President of the Federal Environment Agency Dirk Messner, Hamburg's Senator for Science Katharina Fegebank and Yale Professor Elijah Anderson.
