Michael Schaepman Nominated Vice President

On 1 August 2017, Michael Schaepman is scheduled to begin his new position as Vice President for Veterinary Medicine and Natural Sciences of the University of Zurich. On Monday evening, the Senate submitted  his nomination to the Board of the University; the term of office runs to the end of July 2018.

The exceptional nomination procedure became necessary because the Office of the Vice President for Medicine and Science will be divided into an Office of the Vice President for Medicine and an Office for the Vice President for Veterinary Medicine and Natural Sciences. (More information in a UZH News articl, in German.) The current Vice President for Medicine and Science, Christoph Hock, will assume the role of Vice President for Medicine as of 1 August 2017.

The Office of the Vice President for Medicine is an interim solution until the University introduces its new organizational structure. In 2015, the Parliament of the Canton of Zurich resolved on the creation of a new position: Director of University Medicine Zurich. The future Director will also be a member of the Executive Board of the University. The new “Office of the Vice President for Medicine” will exist until all necessary legal steps have been taken.

The “Vice President for Veterinary Medicine and Natural Sciences” will assume responsibility for the Vetsuisse Faculty and the Faculty of Science, and will oversee the university-wide processes of the previous Office of the Vice President for Medicine and Science.

Remote sensing of Earth

On 17 May, the Board of the University votes on the appointment of Michael Schaepman to Vice President for Veterinary Medicine and Natural Sciences.

Michael Schaepman (born in 1966) was appointed full professor of remote sensing at the University of Zurich in 2009. He earned his Diploma (equivalent to a Master's degree) in geography, with minors in experimental physics and informatics, from UZH in 1993 and, in 1998, he earned his doctoral degree at the Department of Geography of the University of Zurich. Afterwards, he worked at the University of Arizona in Tucson before returning the UZH Department of Geography to lead a research group. From 2003 to 2008, Michael Schaepman was professor of geographical information science with a focus on remote sensing at Wageningen University (Netherlands) where, as of 2005, he was academic head of the Center for Geoinformation.

He has been professor of remote sensing and head of the Remote Sensing Laboratories at UZH since 2009. His research priorities include Earth observation, remote sensing, and spectroscopy. Michael Schaepman is also Dean of the Faculty of Science.