In the fall of 2020 Professor Hoch was appointed for a second four-year term of office by the University’s Electoral Assembly. The appointment procedure was abbreviated, as the Senate and University Council had approached Hoch requesting that he serve a second term, forgoing advertising of an open position. In early March 2021 the University’s Electoral Assembly confirmed the Vice Rectors proposed by Professor Hoch comprising larger board of the Rectorate.
The Vice Rectors are not in the exclusive employ of the University. Introducing the Vice Rectors: Professor Maren Bennewitz, Digitalization and Information Management; Professor Irmgard Förster, Equal Opportunity and Diversity; Professor Birgit Ulrike Münch, International Affairs, Professor Klaus Sandmann, Student Affairs, Teaching, University Development; Professor Annette Scheersoi, Sustainability; Professor Andreas Zimmer, Research, Grad Student Affairs. Vice Rectors Bennewitz, Sandmann and Zimmer are in their second term of office.
The University of Bonn Rectorate now has gender parity for the first time, becoming only the second German University of Excellence to have an equal number of men and women as on its governing board. The Vice Rector responsibility areas have been reorganized to reflect the higher priority assigned to issues relevant to Equal Opportunity and Diversity, Sustainability and Digitalization, in view of their importance regarding the development of the University overall. Professor Hoch successfully led the University of Bonn through the Excellence Contest conducted by the federal government and the German states in 2019 from which the University of Bonn emerged triumphant, receiving recognition of six Clusters of Excellence along with the coveted status as University of Excellence, ahead of all other contestants. In 2019 Hoch was voted University Head of the Year by CHE and the weekly newspaper Die Zeit, and was named Rector of the Year both in 2020 and this year again by the German Association of University Professors and Lecturers (DHV).
