Long-time Bavarian Minister President receives TU Munich's highest honor
Dr. Edmund Stoiber to be named TUM Honorary Senator
Dr. Edmund Stoiber was Minister President of Bavaria from 1993 until 2007. As head of the government, he succeeded among other things in the implementation of leading-edge university reforms. As a result, TUM was given greater freedom, for example in the design of its curricula and its governance structure. Under a wide-ranging experimentation clause in Bavaria’s University and College Act (Hochschulgesetz), in 1999 TUM became the first German University to establish a university Board of Trustees, half of whose members are prominent external personalities. Almost all of these innovations were later adopted by the other German Federal States and were incorporated in the subsequent amendments to the Bavarian University and College Act. Today Bavaria is counted among Europe's leading scientific regions.
Many of the new TUM buildings constructed in past decades are the result of Dr. Stoiber's dedicated efforts. These include in particular the FRM II research neutron source, the buildings for the Departments of Mechanical Engineering, Mathematics and Informatics as well as the Institute for Medical Technology in Garching, the central library and the TUM School of Life Sciences Weihenstephan. Stoiber also fulfilled the promise made by his ministerial predecessors and extended Munich's U6 subway line to the Garching Campus. Since October 2006 students have been able to travel from Munich's city center directly to the "Garching-Forschungszentrum" subway station.
Lasting achievements
Dr. Stoiber continued to exert a formative influence on the development of TUM after his tenure as Minister President, in particular as an active member of the university Board of Trustees (2007-2015). He is ultimately personally responsible for the founding of the Science Center Straubing (2001). In October 2017 the Center became the "TUM Campus Straubing for Biotechnology and Sustainability", the fourth TUM location together with Munich, Garching and Freising-Weihenstephan.
“Without Dr. Edmund Stoiber, TUM and Bavaria would not be what they are today,” says TUM President Prof. Wolfgang A. Herrmann regarding the designation as Honorary Senator. “He is the most worthy candidate for the highest award of our university as the act launching the celebration marking the 150th anniversary of the founding of TUM.”