COLUMN. Eric Hanse, interim Dean for the past year, is now looking forward to a permanent dean being appointed to the position. At the same time, he would like to share his thanks for all the good support he has received.
Let me start with what is most important: I want to wish all of you who are members of the staff here at Sahlgrenska Academy a really enjoyable Christmas holiday. I think we all need to relax for a while, considering the intense work we put in at our Faculty.
In a short time, I will return to what I often say is my real job: being a teacher and researcher in synaptic and cellular neurophysiology. As far as teaching is concerned, I plan to catch up with the development of the course components for the Program in Medicine and other courses in which I participate. With respect to research, I lead an active team investigating, among other topics, silent synapses, which are precursors to glutamatergic synapses in the brain associated with Huntington’s disease and other neurodegenerative diseases.
A prerequisite for me to be able to serve as interim Dean has been the ability to maintain my research and continue teaching. I have been able to do this, thanks to the excellent support I’ve received. I would especially like to thank the assistant dean group, which I have been working with intensely during the year, with meetings almost every week. I would also like to say a special thank you to our Faculty Office, which provides extremely professional support for the Faculty’s management. I believe that all of us working at Sahlgrenska Academy this year have been aware that our temporary management situation was temporary, and that everyone has helped to facilitate this situation. We pulled together to get through this period and that feels wonderful.
It is with some mixed emotions that I now leave the assignment as interim Dean. It’s something special to be in the center of all the activity and all the flows of information. It’s stimulating, but it can also be a little too intense. I expect there will be a sense of emptiness when I no longer find myself in this position, but personally, I also feel that it is a positive and good thing that we now are getting a more long-term solution for management of the Faculty.
When the next management steps in, it will be great to turn over the reins with our operations in full blossom. Right now the Faculty is doing really well on all fronts. We’re expanding in terms of education, external research grants and employees, and there are many external partners who gladly would like to collaborate with us.
Yet we have by no means reached our full potential, and most likely we will continue to expand. Among other things, we need new premises. At the moment, both Sahlgrenska Life and Naturvetenskap Life are on hold between two phases of the construction process. Sahlgrenska Life’s pilot study has just ended, and Naturvetenskap Life soon will be ready with its construction plans. Planning for both these construction projects is still at an early phase of a long process. I think I will continue to be involved in these plans for Medicinareberget, but it is still not yet quite clear in what way. I’m excited about following developments in the coming years.
Eric Hanse
