Dear reader,

In this volume Masaryk University presents the sixth annual report of its activities for the past calendar and financial year (the year 1999).

The 1999 year saw Masaryk University continuing in its process of development, the trends of which serve to confirm its 80 year tradition as the second university of the Czech Republic and the largest school of higher education in Brno. The growing number of students and applicants reflects the high level of interest in university education, and proves its importance with regard to professional engagement in the society of today and public demand for an open educational system. Striving to meet needs and demands, Masaryk University has extended the range of study programmes it offers and has increased its capacity in spite of the fact that current financial restraints penalizes such behaviour.

Masaryk University’s aim is to profile itself as a university with a large share of its own research activities. The school endeavours to achieve permanent growth in grant activities and the systematic reducing of the average age of academics participating both in research and education. Activities connected to the implementation of institutionalized research projects are of major importance, and profiling research work at individual MU faculties concentrates on these issues. A high-quality research background enables Masaryk University to be involved in the work of newly established centres of basic and applied research.

The primary developmental aim of Masaryk University is the construction of its campus in Bohunice. The year 1999 saw a series of key negotiations with the Brno Council Office and at ministerial level which concentrated on the material and financial support of the project, thus creating prerequisites for the further negotiating of financial support with European finance institutions.

The structure of this report corresponds with the structure of its previous issues, and enables the public to compare the highlights in the development of Masaryk University in terms of both quantity and quality. Modifying details answer requirements of Act No. 111/98 in Coll. on Higher Education, which imposes the issuing of an annual report on all schools of higher education in the Czech Republic. Masaryk University also published the Long-term Outlook of MU, another significant document available to the public in which the university gives information about its activities from a slightly different angle. This document was completed in the autumn of 1999, was discussed and approved by appropriate boards and negotiated with the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport of the Czech Republic.

In 1999, MU strove to meet the wording of Act No. 111/98 in Coll. on Higher Education and to fulfil its new position as a public legal institution. It processed new statutory regulations, and concentrated on the implementation of a more integrated range of study which allows greater permeability through individual study subjects and disciplines by means of a newly created university-wide information system.

 

Jiří Zlatuška - Rector