EPFL Assembly elections: Be the next voice for your community!

Today, active participation is as important as ever, with the advent of educational technologies introducing unprecedented opportunities and potential threats alongside rising cost of living and cuts to research funding. As an assembly or council member, you will have a seat at the table for high-level discussions involving the School’s direction, where you will represent your community’s perspective on vital issues, from tuition fees and salaries to curriculum development and campus infrastructure.

Campus-wide elections for a total of 16 representatives for the School’s four bodies (students, intermediary staff, teaching staff, and administrative and technical staff) in the EPFL Assembly will take place on May 03. 2024. The mandate covers a two-year period (one year for students. Elections for School Council members, which represent EPFL’s Schools and Colleges in School Council meetings, will be held on the same day. Candidates are permitted to run for multiple positions.

To announce your candidacy and cast your votes on election day, head over to your EPFL bio page at people.epf.ch. And if you are still undecided or need more encouragement, take a look at the five testimonials by current members showcased below.

Aleksandra Radenovic

President of the School Assembly, Full Professor in the Laboratory of Nanoscale Biology.
AE member since 2018.

Looking back on six years in the School Assembly, four of which I served in the role of vice president and president, I can only encourage everyone to consider joining the Assembly to contribute to the democratic functioning of our campus. By maintaining an active dialog between the campus population and the direction, we can work together to increase the visibility of the School Assembly, raise concerns, and collectively shape the future of EPFL.

Over the past years, we’ve seen progress on many fronts. We’ve improved communications with the Faculty Councils, which are now operational in all EPFL’s Schools and Colleges. We’ve maintained a good dialog with Agépoly, the official student association, and supported the bottom-up revival – by postdocs and PhD students – of ACIDE, which represents doctoral students, postdocs, and staff scientists. We’ve also enhanced our outstanding partnership with ETH Zurich, which has allowed both sides to learn from each other and discover processes and solutions that work.

Today, the future of research and education is questioned and challenged, with no clear path forward. That’s why the EPFL School Assembly needs you now more than ever. By increasing participation from across campus, we can build a more inclusive School Assembly that effectively represents the entire campus population in discussions addressing the many challenges EPFL faces today.

Consuelo Antille

Representative of the administrative and technical staff, Faculty administrator, Dean's office, ENAC.
AE member since 2010

I encourage you to run for the Council of your Faculty or for the EPFL School Assembly and to support the candidates with your votes.

Committing to a role in the Faculty Council or the School Assembly requires time but is worthwhile: It will give you a better understanding of how EPFL and the EPF domain operate. It will let you interact directly with members of EPFL's direction, participate in pre-consultation working groups, and actively proposing ideas. Throughout, you will be representing your portion of the campus community in discussions and contributing to solidarity among the various communities.

Participating in the School Assembly is a highly motivating civic mandate at the service of the entire community and defending human values at EPFL. I am a longstanding member of the AE and remain equally motivated and convinced of its usefulness.

Thank you for your future commitment, and for your support to your elected representatives.

Pamina Winkler

Vice-President of AE and Representative of scientific staff, EPDA policy working group officer, STI Faculty council member, Postdoc in the SuNMIL group.
AE member since 2022.

I got to know EPFL’s School Assembly through my engagement as policy working group officer of the EPFL postdoc association (EPDA), which I joined to grow my network at EPFL when I arrived in the post-but-still COVID period in July 2021. This motivated me to go one step further and represent not just my own interests but also those of the whole postdoc community as part of the School Assembly. Joining the Assembly allowed me to step up my involvement at EPFL, grow my network, and get a glimpse into how policy and decision-making works at EPFL and Switzerland – all at once!

My roles as vice president of the School Assembly as well as representing the intermediate body (composed of postdocs, PhD students and staff scientists) exposed me to less visible but no less important aspects of academia, including interactions with the School’s vice presidents, and discussions related to budget cuts and employment conditions. Exchanging with the campus community, for example, at the big Vivapoly event, enhanced our engagement with the EPFL community on campus. Furthermore, the exchange with our ETH Zürich homologue helped sharpen our and their arguments in salary negotiations and in policies regarding food prices.

Moving forward, the School Assembly will continue to work towards being a voice for the whole EPFL community. Of course, representing your community takes time, and change can be frustratingly slow. But if you enjoy seeing the bigger picture, have an interest in shaping policy, and are eager to support your community, it’s a great place to start.

Lena Vogel

Representative of the student body, Student in Life Sciences Engineering.
AE member since 2023.

As a student who has always been politically involved, inside and outside of EPFL, I ran for the position as student representative in the School Assembly to defend the interests of students at the institutional level. I was interested in understanding how decisions are made at EPFL and what the School Assembly's leverage on them was.

After half a year representing the student body, I’ve come away with an esteem for the 16 representatives that make up the School Assembly. I was surprised by the consistent political alignment among the members and impressed by their thoughtful positions emphasizing the present and future wellbeing of the EPFL community.

It’s difficult to evaluate the impact I’ve had, but I believe that in large institutions like EPFL it is essential to put people from all bodies in a room. While the School Assembly lacks the power to enforce decisions, it does offer the campus community an efficient communication bridge with the Direction to defend their interests. Serving as a School Assembly member has been an interesting, enriching experience that I would recommend to anyone willing to represent the interests of their group.

Antoine Hoffmann

Representative of the scientific staff, Doctoral assistant at the Swiss Plasma Center.
AE member since 2022

Having represented EPFL PhD students at the start of my PhD thesis, I saw joining the EPFL School Assembly as the logical next step to represent my community.

An important achievement during my term was the reinvigoration of ACIDE, the association representing PhD students, postdocs, and scientific staff on campus. While it took hard work, it was satisfying to contribute to this effort by ensuring continuous support from the School Assembly throughout the process. Now that ACIDE is back, it can once again defend the rights and represent the interests of its constituents.

Another memorable intervention took place at Vivapoly, where we had the opportunity to survey the opinions of the EPFL community firsthand, on the ground. The fact that we were perceived as independent of the School’s management allowed us to have much more relaxed and candid exchanges with the people we spoke to.

Participating in the School Assembly taught me a lot about communicating, supporting, discussing, and implementing new initiatives, overcoming resistance, and making myself heard. And at the end of the day, it was rewarding to learn more about the mechanisms that make a research institution like EPFL work. The role was also a perfect complement to my thesis and injected fresh energy into my research.