Criti­cal thin­king and crea­tive designs

In St. Gallen entsteht das HSG Lear­ning Center der HSG Stif­tung,
St. Gallen is the home of the HSG Foundation’s HSG Lear­ning Center, an incu­ba­tor for new criti­cal thin­king and crea­tive design formats. It follows in the foot­s­teps of the Univer­sity of St. Gallen’s holi­stic tradi­tion in rese­arch and teaching, and is inten­ded to signi­fi­cantly enhance the vision of teaching and lear­ning in the future.

The Univer­sity of St. Gallen finan­ces half of its over­all budget from its own sources, such as part­ner­ships, further educa­tion and services. The HSG Foun­da­tion plays a crucial role as it is respon­si­ble for donations. 

The HSG Foun­da­tion was foun­ded in 2001 by the Univer­sity of St. Gallen’s alumni orga­ni­sa­tion, under the name of the ‘HSG Alumni Foun­da­tion’. In 2013, it chan­ged its name and took on a new struc­ture. The foun­da­tion aims to foster the deve­lo­p­ment of the Univer­sity of St. Gallen as one of the world’s leading univer­si­ties of econo­mics and business

The HSG Lear­ning Center is on track

The foun­da­tion stone was laid for the HSG Lear­ning Center a good year ago. ‘Despite the pande­mic, cons­truc­tion is going to plan and we have made good inroads into deve­lo­ping content at direc­tor level,’ says a plea­sed Risch. ‘This means the project is on track and we are deligh­ted that this inno­va­tive teaching and lear­ning plat­form will soon be open.’ And that day will be here soon: the HSG Foun­da­tion will hand over the buil­ding to the Univer­sity of St. Gallen in early 2022, with the opening plan­ned for Febru­ary 2022 before the start of the spring semester.

Moti­va­tion for active, coura­ge­ous participation

In line with its guiding mission for the HSG Lear­ning Center, ‘New Land’, HSG belie­ves that gradua­tes need to leave their comfort zones and explore ‘terra inco­gni­tae’ in order to deve­lop their entre­pre­neu­rial spirit and inno­va­tive strength. Risch says that recent deve­lo­p­ments in busi­ness and society have also had an effect on the field of tertiary educa­tion. As a result, the Univer­sity of St. Gallen is respon­ding to these chal­lenges through the HSG Lear­ning Centre. ‘We hope it will deve­lop into a forum for dialo­gue between students, teachers, thought leaders and prac­tice leaders. It’s all about the ability to think criti­cally, design crea­tively and put things into practice.’

At the HSG Lear­ning Center, the aim is that content is deve­lo­ped through parti­ci­pa­tion, in order to give gradua­tes the skills that fall under the guiding prin­ci­ples of new ground, commu­nity spirit, buil­ding bridges, base camp and expe­ri­men­ta­tion. These skills will also enable them to work in the service of the common good, opening the door to life-long learning.

The HSG Lear­ning Center is sche­du­led to open in Febru­ary 2022. This was made possi­ble by HSG’s biggest ever fund­rai­sing campaign.

Supported by former HSG gradua­tes and a broad-based community

The HSG Foundation’s Board of Trus­tees compri­ses alumni of the Univer­sity of St. Gallen, repre­sen­ta­ti­ves of the univer­sity and the presi­dent of the alumni orga­ni­sa­tion. Risch says: ‘It’s very posi­tive that highly successful alumni and entre­pre­neurs on the Board of Trus­tees are commit­ted to the deve­lo­p­ment of their alma mater with passion and dedi­ca­tion.’ The mana­ging direc­tor attri­bu­tes the successful fund­rai­sing to the fact that the Univer­sity St. Gallen not only has one of the largest alumni networks in Europe, but also a highly commit­ted group of entre­pre­neurs and phil­an­thro­pists. The commit­ment of indi­vi­dual successful entre­pre­neurs, whose mana­gers studied at HSG, has contri­bu­ted in parti­cu­lar to this fund­rai­sing success, with the project able to rely on various indi­vi­du­als, foun­da­ti­ons and compa­nies as support­ers. At present, the dona­tion baro­me­ter for the HSG Lear­ning Center stands at CHF 59 million. The goal? CHF 63 million. The HSG Foun­da­tion is coun­ting on addi­tio­nal support from foun­da­ti­ons, indi­vi­du­als and compa­nies to make up the short­fall of CHF 4 million.

We are on the home stretch, but we have not crossed the finish line yet. By the time we open in Febru­ary 2022, we want to have reached the dona­tion target of CHF 63 million, thanks to the dedi­ca­tion of our alumni commu­nity, other foun­da­ti­ons and indi­vi­dual donations.’