At the last meeting of the 2008-2011 period of office, the ETH Board discussed the ETH Domain’s problem caused by having to educate more students without lowering its sights with regard to quality. The number of students in the ETH Domain rose from 15,592 in 2000 to 24,104 in 2010, i.e. by 54.6 %, whereas the Confederation’s funding contribution increased by a mere 24.8 %.

At the same time, there is a lack of 15,000 professionals with a background in mathematics, information technology, natural sciences and technology (MINT), as a current analysis conducted by Economiesuisse and Swiss Engineering has revealed. “The growing student numbers are crucial to Switzerland’s competitiveness”, says Fritz Schiesser, President of the ETH Board.

High-quality teaching requires personnel and infrastructures

ETH Zurich and EPFL have so far handled growth by means of intramural measures and gains in efficiency, but these options have now been exhausted, argues the ETH Board. “High-quality teaching must be close to research, which requires personnel and infrastructures”, points out Ralph Eichler, President of ETH Zurich and member of the ETH Board. ETH Zurich may have been able to establish about 70 additional professorships by means of funding transfers and thanks to third-party resources since 2008, but now investments in further chairs, in senior scientists, as well as in practice rooms and apparatus are necessary.

EPFL has mainly coped with the growth in student numbers through the involvement of younger professors but is now reaching its limits in terms of campus infrastructures. “Our analyses demonstrate that most of our students come from Western Switzerland and adjacent neighbouring countries and that 80 % of them pursue careers in Switzerland after graduation”, says Patrick Aebischer, President of EPFL and member of the ETH Board.

At present, the financial prospects for education, research and innovation are becoming gloomy for the ETH Domain in particular. The ETH Board has therefore decided to dedicate an extraordinary meeting in early 2012 to concrete cutbacks that could be made for the benefit of teaching. “Switzerland cannot afford, for reasons of cost, not to provide the highly qualified graduates required by the economy and by society with an education or to provide them with a poor education, but must instead make investments”, says Hans Hess, the President of Swissmem and member of the ETH Board.

Energy research: special efforts require special resources

The ETH Board insists that no competition must emerge between teaching and research. In the ETH Board’s view, special research efforts require special resources. For instance, the ETH Domain has so far established competencies in energy research and annually invests approximately CHF 140m in this. If additional teams of researchers were funded, the ETH Domain would be able to extend its activities in a number of fields, thus tackling the challenges in a concerted fashion.

Additionally, the ETH Board has set up a working group, whose function is to further strengthen the already intensive knowledge and technology transfer of the institutions of the ETH Domain while facilitating exchanges with the private sector. “In research, we have to invest just as much in cooperation for the purpose of innovation as in lighthouse projects. Enterprises consider the accessibility of research and the international impact of visionary and high-risk research ventures to be prerequisites for investment decisions”, says Paul Herrling, Vice-President of the ETH Board.