News from the Executive Board 2021 / 8
At its last meeting, the Executive Board decided on measures concerning the employee survey and the salary rates for the scientific staff. It also supports the Zurich Forest Laboratory ("Waldlabor Zürich").
Employee survey 2021: Action areas and measures
ETH Zurich conducted an employee survey in the spring of 2021. The results were communicated in the summer of this year. Now the Executive Board, along with the Vice Presidency for Personnel Development and Leadership (VPPL), has identified the following four action areas:
- Leadership, management/supervision and development
- Diversity and respect
- Mental/psychological health
- Dealing with change
In all these action areas, measures are now to be taken to maintain existing strengths and optimise issues where the survey results show there is potential for improvement. More information will follow shortly in the Internal news.
Salaries for scientific staff
The Executive Board discussed the salary rates for scientific staff and decided that the 2022 salary rates for doctoral students (Scientific Assistant I) will remain unchanged from 2021; those for postdoctoral students (Scientific Assistant II) will be adjusted for inflation as of 1 January 2022, in accordance with existing practice. The ETH Board, the strategic governing body for the ETH Domain, will determine the percentage of the cost-of-living adjustment before the end of the year and communicate it separately.
In contrast to the salaries of postdocs, those of doctoral students are not affected by the ETH Board’s decision on the cost-of-living adjustment. Doctoral salaries are determined by the rates of the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) – and these have remained unchanged for a long time. The social partners and AVETH, the association of non-faculty scientific staff, have both criticised this situation. For 2022, the Executive Board has left ETH rates and their connection to the SNSF unchanged, but the issue will be taken up with the SNSF. The salary model for doctoral students at ETH allows for five rates. Two-thirds of the doctoral students at ETH Zurich are paid above the standard SNSF rate.
New continuing education programmes
The Executive Board has approved seven new continuing education programmes: one MAS and two CAS in Preservation and Construction History (D-ARCH) and one MAS and three CAS in Digital Clinical Research (D-HEST).
MAS/CAS in Preservation and Construction History
Since the MAS ETH in Conservation Science was discontinued in 2013, there has been no continuing education at ETH in the field of heritage preservation.
This is now changing: under the direction of Professor Silke Langenberg, the new MAS ETH in Preservation and Construction History will start in the 2022 Autumn Semester. The continuing education programme, which lasts two years as part-time study, is method-oriented and interdisciplinary. It is aimed primarily at people with a Master’s degree in architecture or civil engineering, but also at students of art and cultural history, restoration and archaeology.
MAS/CAS in Digital Clinical Research
Digitalisation plays a major role in clinical research: the use of algorithms to analyse large amounts of data and machine learning to recognise patterns are just two examples. However, using these tools requires precise knowledge of the advantages and disadvantages of the various methods. Overall, what is needed are new course content and visionary approaches to clinical research.
Against this backdrop, ETH is establishing a suite of new continuing education programmes: the MAS in Digital Clinical Research, which is modular and consists of the CAS in Modern Concepts in Clinical Research, the CAS in Nutrition in Medicine, the CAS in Regulatory Thinking, and the CAS in Digital Health (CAS DH). The latter was already approved by the Executive Board in April of this year and is based at D-MTEC.
Support for Waldlabor Zürich
In 2019, the external page Waldlabor Zürich was set up on the Hönggerberg hill, in the immediate vicinity of the ETH campus and the Affoltern and Höngg neighbourhoods. This forest laboratory is an experiential learning and research site that showcases past, present and future forms of forest care and management and brings to life the importance of managed forests to society. In addition to researchers from ETH Zurich and the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research (WSL), experts from the city and canton of Zurich as well as forest owners and forestry personnel also participate in the association that runs the Waldlabor.
ETH Zurich is represented by Harald Bugmann, Professor at the Institute of Terrestrial Ecosystems. The Waldlabor’s establishment phase between 2019 and 2021 was co-financed by contributions from the ETH Executive Board and the Department of Environmental Systems Science. Now, the Executive Board has decided to support the four-year programme (2022–2025) with another financial contribution. For the Executive Board, this forest laboratory represents a unique opportunity for dialogue between researchers and the wider community.
Among the Waldlabor projects that ETH Zurich is involved in are an arboretum that is unique in Europe (D-USYS), a hydrological monitoring project (D-BAUG) and a soil nature trail (D-USYS/WSL). In addition, there are preliminary projects for a tower to measure material flows (Flux Tower, D-USYS) and for a monitoring database (D-BAUG).
Contact: Waldlabor Office () and ETH Coordination Office for the Waldlabor (.
