Surrounded by basketball nets and ropes, 150-200 students from Aarhus BSS sit and try to learn about financial accounting, which is the subject today. The front rows are packed and extension cords snake across the floor.

The lecture normally takes place in suitable lecture theatres on Fuglesangs Allé, but because these lecture theatres are currently being renovated, hundreds of students from various subjects have had their lectures moved to a sports hall – and this has been going on for weeks.

A waste of time

A sports hall just isn’t an optimal setting for teaching, according to criticism from two MSc students, Joachim Krogstrup Mikkelsen and Morten Svendsen. The latter is the chair of the Academic Business Council at Aarhus BSS and both are members of the board of studies at Business Administration.

They find it particularly problematic that it’s the first semester students in particular who have had their teaching moved to the sports hall.

"It stresses the new students unnecessarily. They stay away from the lectures because the conditions are so poor that they don’t benefit from being there anyway. They can’t read what the lecturer is writing and in some cases they have trouble hearing what’s being said. So many of them feel like they are wasting their time. It’s important for the new students to get a good impression of the degree programme and to develop some good study habits right from the start, rather than getting into a bad habit and not coming to the lectures."

Not enough whiteboard space

The two students' criticism is backed up by associate professor in economics Finn Schøler. He is one of the lecturers who has seen his lectures moved to the sports hall, which he too finds unsuitable for purpose.

"It’s not a particularly appropriate room to teach in. You can’t see the students sitting in the back rows and I’ve had to alter my teaching, because there weren’t proper whiteboard facilities. I have three mobile whiteboards available, but the students at the back of the room can only see the top 20-30 centimetres of the board. When teaching the first semester students in particular, I use the whiteboard to illustrate my points," he says.

He agrees with the two students that it is unfortunate that the relocation affects the new students. He therefore went over a map of AU with them during the final lesson before his course was relocated, so that the students would know where to go next time.

"They’ve only just started and many of them don’t come from Aarhus. Everything is already new for them – and then we tell them they have to go somewhere completely different. We mustn’t just leave the new students in the lurch. We need to nurse them a little," he says.

Why now?

Both Finn Schøler and the two students find it puzzling that the premises at Fuglesangs Allé weren’t renovated during the recent summer holiday.

"I can’t really understand why the renovation must be done right at the start of the semester, as those lecture theatres are completely empty from December to February and again from May to September," says Finn Schøler.

Annoying

Vice-dean for education at Aarhus BSS, Peder Østergaard, has spoken to several students who weren’t satisfied with the conditions. 

"It's annoying. But we became aware of the need to renovate the lecture theatres at such a late date that it was difficult to react appropriately. Our planning office has been working overtime to find solutions and has been forced to do some double planning. They’re doing the best they can and we’re certainly aware that this isn’t a popular solution among the students. We’re not happy with the situation either."

Things take time ...

The decision to allocate funds to renovate a total of thirty lecture theatres around AU, among them at Fuglesangs Allé, was taken by the senior management team in the spring. In many places, the AV equipment really needed replacing.

Peter Bruun Nielsen is deputy director of AU IT and chair of the steering committee responsible for the renovation. He explains why the renovation of the lecture theatres has come into conflict with the commencement of studies.

"It hasn’t been possible to begin the renovation before the summer holidays because of the size of the project, which means there must be a tender process, which takes time. There is a fixed procedure that we must follow, and before that fell into place we were already at the beginning of the summer holidays. The scope of the project has required quite a bit of preparation and planning and the project is so extensive that it wouldn’t be possible to complete it during a summer holiday."

Why not wait and start the renovation during the Christmas holidays?

"That wasn’t possible either. First of all because the money must be used during the current budget year, and secondly because the present situation is undesirable. There are major problems with the AV equipment in many lecture theatres, so it is therefore high time for them to be modernised," says Peter Bruun Nielsen.

Also annoying when equipment breaks down

He is aware that the decision to renovate the lecture theatres in connection with the start of the semester has created problems for the planning of the teaching.

"Of course this hasn’t been optimal for the individual student. However, we’re talking about a limited period, and it’s also annoying sitting in a lecture when the equipment breaks down. We’ve had to do things this way and this has and will cause some inconvenience in the short term. But we’ve managed to come up with a viable plan, even though it’s required a great deal of planning. The employees involved have shown a great deal of flexibility so that we can achieve our goal, even though the schedule is very tight," says Peter Bruun Nielsen.

He’s not surprised that a renovation project of this size causes inconvenience:

"If the project absolutely required no inconvenience for anybody, then it simply wouldn’t be possible to carry it out."

Translated by Peter Lambourne