On Monday 31st October the University of Bremen celebrated its 40th birthday in the Upper Hall of the City Hall with a reception hosted by the Bremen Senate. Many famous personalities were among the more than 300 guests from politics, academia, and the business community who gathered to mark the occasion of the University’s 40th anniversary.
Picture gallery of City Hall Reception
From the “Profmobil” outside the City Hall, Geography Professor Ivo Mossig vividly illustrated the major social and economic significance of the University for the Federal State of Bremen and the whole region of North West Germany. Welcoming his guests at the reception that followed, Bremen‘s Mayor, Jens Böhrnsen, assessed the founding of the University in 1971 as a “milestone in Bremen’s history”, comparable in importance to the development of the ports or the industrialization of the 19th century.
The University Rector, Wilfried Müller, looked back over the changes the University has undergone over the past four decades, paying tribute to the huge effort that transformed the much vilified “forge of left-wing cadre” into one of Germany’s most successful mid-sized universities today. In the forty years since its founding it has moved from being – "a leftist reform university without any majority backing in the town to become one of Germany’s most successful universities".
The chairperson of the General Students Committee, Stefan Weger, expressed his regret that in the wake of the changes extolled by Rector Müller many reforms that the students would like to have retained had fallen by the wayside. He explicitly mentioned the so-named “civil clause” – it would be a great favor to the University if this clause were to be embedded in the state constitution instead of being, in the opinion of the students, further watered down. Before the reception began, about 50 students had demonstrated their support for this proposal outside the City Hall. Weger also called for more Master’s programs to be installed in Bremen.
