A new university council was elected. Prof. Dr. Welf-Guntram Drossel,  Director of the Fraunhofer Institute for Machine Tools and Forming Technology IWU in Chemnitz, was appointed as the new first Chairman. He will continue his work as a member of the University Council and is looking forward to the future challenges as Chairman.

He emphasized that the University Council sees itself as a strategic driving force for the university management and would like to support the university in acting as a central player in the structural change of the region.

The tasks of the University Council are set out in Section 86 of the Saxon Freedom of Higher Education Act. It makes recommendations on profile development and improving the performance and competitiveness of the university and is responsible, among other things, for preparing a proposal for the election of the rector, approving the university's development plan, the draft business plan and the annual financial statements.

The members were appointed by the Senate and the State Ministry of Science and the Arts for a term of office of five years. The term of office of the current University Council runs from February 2020 to February 2025.

According to the new chairman, it is above all the practice-oriented teaching and application-oriented research in socially relevant future fields, such as the design of a sustainable climate-neutral energy system, the digitalization of the economy, but also in the social sciences through to nursing, that make extremely important contributions to the development of the region.

Professor Drossel believes that the university is about to take the next significant step in its development, and that he is personally committed to playing an active role in shaping this, "because the establishment of the Upper Lusatia Plastics Center by the Fraunhofer IWU almost 10 years ago has already provided an important impetus in this regard."