Josiane Aubert to chair Foundation Board

Josiane Aubert's role will be to ensure that the reform of the institution initiated last March runs smoothly, guaranteeing the continuity of its academic mission and ensuring its lasting influence.

On March 8, 2018, the political representatives of HEMU-CL's main financial backers intervened in the governance crisis facing the institution. On March 12, the Board of Trustees validated the public authorities' decisions on the reform to be carried out. Five members of the Board, including current President Nicolas Gillard, announced their decision to hand in their mandates by the end of April, paving the way for the desired overhaul.
 
Josiane Aubert was nominated by the Canton of Vaud, the HEMU-CL's main financial backer, with the support of the three other public contributors, namely the Cantons of Fribourg and Valais, and the City of Lausanne. A Socialist from the Vallée de Joux, where she lives, 69-year-old Josiane Aubert was a member of the Vaud Grand Council (2003-2007) and then a member of the National Council (2007-2014).
 
Josiane Aubert was a member of the National Council's Science-Education-Culture Commission, which she chaired and in which she participated in drafting the law on the promotion of higher education (LEHE). Highly committed to associations, she chaired the Ecole de Musique de la Vallée de Joux and sat on the committee of the Association vaudoise des Conservatoires et Ecoles de Musique for almost thirty years. She chaired the Orchestre des jeunes de Suisse romande. Her intimate knowledge of the workings of the education system also led her to become involved (vice-president) in the EESP Foundation, whose status is similar to that of the HEMU-CL, both institutions being private but subsidized by the State and attached to the University of Applied Sciences Western Switzerland (HES-SO).
 
Driven by a passion for music and a concern that society should encourage the emergence of young talent, Josiane Aubert was heavily involved in the legislative work governing access to musical training. Sensitive to the principles governing public service (equality, transparency, continuity) and keen to federate private and public players, she was a much-listened-to voice during the drafting of the Vaud law on music schools and then the constitutional article on music. Both of these were aimed at the same goal: to promote access to music in the canton of Vaud and in Switzerland as a whole, through a diversified offer of quality musical training for both professionals and amateurs.
 
A working group chaired by the former rector of the University of Lausanne, Dominique Arlettaz, will make recommendations early this summer for the reorganization of the HEMU-CL's operational and strategic management bodies. It will be up to the Board, now chaired by Josiane Aubert, to decide on these proposals, and then to implement the reorganization measures it deems necessary and appropriate.