Dr. Georg Schütte is the new Secretary General of the Volkswagen Foundation
At its summer meeting, the Board of Trustees of the Volkswagen Foundation elected Dr. Georg Schütte (born 1962) as the new Secretary General. He takes up his post on January 1, 2020, and succeeds Dr. Wilhelm Krull (born 1952)
Dr. Georg Schütte has held the post of Staatssekretär at the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) since 2009. He takes up his post as the new Secretary General of the Volkswagen Foundation on January 1, 2020, and succeeds Dr. Wilhelm Krull. Krull has headed the Foundation since 1996, retires from office, and will be assuming new responsibilities outside the Foundation.
Chairman of the Board of Trustees Dr. Gabriele Heinen-Kljajić summes up: "I am delighted that we have succeeded in winning Dr. Georg Schütte, an internationally renowned expert in the fields of science management and promoting innovation. With fresh impetus, he will continue to advance Germany's largest private science funding foundation along its successful path. The Board of Trustees would like to express its gratitude to its predecessor, Dr. Wilhelm Krull, to whom the Foundation owes its reputation as an internationally outstanding promoter of science".
Before taking up his duties in the BMBF, Dr. Georg Schütte was (from 2004) Secretary General of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation in Bonn. From 2001 to 2003, he was Managing Director of the German-American Fulbright Commission in Berlin, where he contributed to promoting academic exchange and understanding between Germany and the USA. During these years, he also belonged to the expert group "Benchmarking Human Resources" that advises the EU Commission. From 1998 to 2001, Dr. Georg Schütte headed the General Policy Department of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. From 1984 to 1989 he studied journalism at the University of Dortmund and "Television and Radio" at the City University of New York, and in 1992 he was a Visiting Fellow at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Harvard University.
Dr. Georg Schütte is looking forward to the new challenges: "Private foundations stand for innovation and dependability. They are central actors in a civil society that is committed to the common good. I look forward to working with and within the Volkswagen Foundation, to supporting top level science in Germany, to providing impetus for innovation in the science system, and to strengthening international networking and Germany’s international reputation for science and research. I would like to thank the Board for the trust they have placed in me".
Schütte is chairman of many academic committees as well as a member of the main committee of the German Research Foundation and the German Science Council, a member of the senate of the Helmholtz Association, the board of trustees of the Bibliotheca Hertziana – Max Planck Institute for Art History in Rome, and the advisory board of the Fulbright Alumni Association. He is married and has two children.
