Senate Notes (20 March 2019)

On Wednesday 20 March, the second meeting of the new Academic Senate took place, with its main topic being the next building construction on Plzeňská. By Dr Eva Fürstová, illustrations by Dr Adam Kalina.


On Wednesday 20 March, the second meeting of the new Academic Senate took place, with its main topic being the next building construction on Plzeňská. By Dr Eva Fürstová, illustrations by Dr Adam Kalina, translated by Paulina Bernardová.

At the beginning, the Dean took over the speech and informed us about news from the faculty. Negotiations with the Rector and Vice-Rector of the Czech Technical University on construction at Plzeňská are in progress. A new head of the Institute of Physiology, prof. MUDr. Jiruška, was chosen. The admission processes are approaching with the interest in our faculty still being high: 2 142 applications for General Medicine, 508 for Physiotherapy (Bc. and NMgr.) and 228 for the Nursing programme (General and the newly opened Paediatric Nursing).

Several meetings with the faculty management and our Senate committees are planned as well as an external meeting of the Dean's Collegium. The latter will primarily address updating the curriculum and the AKORD project. The Dean also informed us about the sad news of the passing of prof. MUDr. Herget, whose memory we honored with a minute of silence.

Next on our busy schedule was prof. MUDr. Marusič who introduced us to the AKORD project (more information can be found in the interview with prof. MUDr. Marusič himself, in Czech). He introduced us to the preliminary results of a survey among graduates. The questionnaire addressed 665 graduates with a 57 percent return rate on the day of our meeting.

Random info: Most graduates think that the last year of study should take the form of an internship in the in-patient unit; most graduates have the feeling that we have not gained sufficient knowledge in the organization of health care; 15.2 percent of our graduates have gone abroad; and most graduates think that the faculty has prepared us well for taking anamnesis!

Following, prof. Petr Zuna, who was nominated for the position as a member of the Scientific Council, got elected with fourteen votes in a secret ballot.

Much of the meeting revolved around the new building constructions. Representatives of the Rectorate Construction Department, the Institute of History and Archive of the Charles University (ÚDAUK) and the architect of the project, Ing. Kurzová, Mgr. Cajthaml and Ing. Novotný accepted our invitation. The building will be located in the area of Plzeňská between Žížala and ČVUT. The architect introduced us to the project form, but also to detailed technical data. (We need a new water and sewage system! It will lead through the CTU territory, phew). Work on the project ÚDAUK is carried out in cooperation with Bc. Jirsa, who is in charge of the reconstruction project of the front part of Žížala (so-called ‘Hlavička’ (diminutiv of head) or ‘čtvrtá etapa’ (fourth stage of construction in Plzeňská). The construction, beginning with the destruction of ‘Hlavička’, is planned for 2020 with completion in 2022. A public discussion on this subject took place on 7 March in the small lecture hall in presence of interested students.

With the approaching end, chairman MUDr. Trojánek presented the common goals of the pedagogic chamber while the Vice-chairman O. Hubálek presented the common goals of the student chamber. We have many goals in common. We all want to work on improving and optimizing the teaching at our faculty and we all know that therefore adequate motivation of the teachers is necessary.

Since our last meeting all committees have met, elected their chairmen and outlined their agenda.

For the position of chairwoman of the legislative committee doc. MUDr. Maxová was elected. This committee will focus mainly on updating the electoral rules and the rules of procedure of the Academic Senate of the Second Faculty.

Prof. MUDr. Kachlík became the chairman of the pedagogic committee. His senators will participate in the optimization of teaching by way of the AKORD project, but at the same time will also address the current student remarks on pharmacology teaching.

Prof. MUDr. Kvapil was elected chairman of the economic committee. As every year, this committee will deal with budgeting, while this time they will also oversee the usage of the new financial contribution from the Ministry of Health (50 million CZK for a 15 percent increase in Czech students).

Viktor Veselý became the chairman of the social committee and has already delivered one of the first tangible results: the creation of a form on the Senate's website through which you will be able to anonymously send inquiries, comments, ideas, but of course also complaints to the senators. The social committee also deals with the Alumni Club of the Second Faculty. Its first constituent meeting will be on 8 April at 6 pm (details on the Facebook event) – all graduates are cordially invited.

The icing on the imaginary cake was the invitation to the upcoming Faculty Night, which will be held on 11 April, as the traditional highlight of the Faculty's Scientific Conference.

MUDr. Eva Fürstová
Senator for the Student Chamber

Created: 25. 3. 2019 / Modified: 6. 5. 2019 / Mgr. Petr Andreas, Ph.D.