Last updated 21. Juli 2025 | Sprecherinnen

[Vorweg] Liebe Komiliton*innen, liebe Universitäts Gemeinschafts und alle weiteren Gäste, die folgende Rede werden wir auf Englisch halten, um auch nicht-deutschsprachige Anwesende teilhaben zu lassen. Vielen dank für Ihr Verständnis.

Dear fellow students, dear university community, dear guests,

We are Denise and Hannah, outgoing spokespersons of the AStA, the general students committee.

We are pleased to be here today and that the Dies Academicus is taking place this year. At the same time, this occasion also brings to mind the controversies surrounding last year’s event.
We welcome the decision not to invite fascist politicians to the ceremony. Nevertheless, we believe it is important to share a few reflections on this matter.
As students—and as humans—we cannot help but feel a sense of fear when we look beyond our immediate environment and out into the world that awaits us.

We believe universities should play a central role within our society and with this a responsibility to uphold democratic values. That belief is why we expect more, especially from a univerity like ours.

In a place where knowledge is meant to be shared and applied, resistance to fascism must extend beyond theory, into practice. Fighting the normalization of fascist ideas is not a debate, and it cannot be something that takes place only in our history books.
From our first semester on, we are taught that our knowledge needs to be shared and applied in order to benefit society as a whole. We take this seriously—and we expect the same from the whole university community. This is not to dismiss the work already done, but to remind us all of what is at stake.
Each time fascist voices are treated as just another opinion, their legitimacy grows. What may seem small often fits into a larger pattern—one that threatens our democratic values, human rights, and the inclusive space we want this university to be.
This is the future we are committed to—and we ask you to stand with us.

A day like today has the potential to highlight the university as a critical space. It gives us a reason to take a step back and provide space for dialogue, for reflection, for everything that goes beyond the limits of our curriculum and everyday campus life.
Universities should not just transmit knowledge, but challenge it. They should create spaces where people from different disciplines and roles learn from and with each other.
Many of us students came here to be part of that—to learn together and participate not to cramm for exams, course requirements and multiple choice tests. How can couriosity, intrinsic motivation and learning processes be valued more than a mark in the end?

Instead of memorizing entire lectures only to forget them by next semester, we wish to leran competencies: to think critically about ourselves and the world, to communicate complex science, understandable to a broader audience.
Above all, we want to be asked, to be heard, and to be taken seriously. Because if we can’t create this change, we risk staying in our beloved ivory tower—cut off from the world we claim to serve, instead of using our knowledge to help shape it.

But learning doesn’t happen in an emty space. For many of us, it’s shaped by daily financial struggles. Just outside the Central Building, you might have noticed the students demonstrating, demanding more attention to how expensive the student fee is here in Lüneburg. Lüneburg has the highest student fees in Lower Saxony and among the highest in Germany.
Educational equity goes far beyond semester fees – Knowing that many of you shape and influence our society on a political, instutional, or individual level, we urge you to stand with us in defending our constitutional right to education and equal opportunity. Reflect on your role in this system—and consider how you can contribute to making education more equitable for all.

In recent months, together with other student representatives across Lower Saxony, we submitted a petition to the Committee for Petitions in the Landtag. We called for better funding for the Studierendenwerke, the abolition of the Verwaltungskostenbeitrag, and a collective agreement (Tarifvertrag) for student workers.
These demands reflect the realities of our daily lives: affordable housing, food, and semester fees; reliable support structures; and fair working conditions that provide financial stability.
We invite you to support these efforts—and to join us in working towards better living conditions for all students, whether through these demands or the many others, students are actively raising.

None of this would have been possible without all the motivated, engaged students, who we also want to celebrate and say thank you today!

Seeing what engaged students can achieve, we wonder why more our voices aren’t heard in shaping our university? Despite many active initiatives, participation and election turnout are declining.
In a polarising world, where democratic participaition on any level is the first step to finding agreements, it seems like much work is done by few and we ask ourselves how we can create better conditions for more people to be involved?
Why don’t more attend elections, lectures, or seminars? Because too often we all need to dare to care and enable genuine participation in committees, teaching, and campus life.
This must be a priority for all of us!
Real participation is hindered by knowledge hierarchies, power imbalances, and discrimination. We need spaces where everyone is heard, valued, and taken seriously— Where we see each other on same, not on opposite sides.

When we think about what our university can be, we envision a free and open space to share knowledge, learn together as equals, and get involved. We want to thank and congratulate everyone who has contributed to this goal—and encourage you to continue building a university we’re proud to be part of: not elitist, but united in solidarity; not neutral, but responsible.

Thank you for your attention and for giving us the opportunity to share our thoughts tonight. We congratulate everyone receiving an award today and wish you all a wonderful celebration!

AStA-Sprecher*innen
Denise Granzow (sie/ihr)
Hannah Spittler (sie/-)
Emil Jüchter (er/ihm)
Theo Lohse (er/ihm)

AStA der Universität Lüneburg
Universitätsallee 1
21335 Lüneburg
Gebäude 9

www.asta-lueneburg.de
Tel.: 04131 677 1907