What else does Elche require from the Universitas Miguel Hernández?

Thus, for example, the City Council has asked this academic institution to disseminate well, more and better the official name of the University as follows: “Miguel Hernández University of Elche”, and, “singularly”, through a series of specific actions.

One of them involves incorporating, in the Rectorate building of the University on the Iliictano campus, the “E” for Elche in the acronyms that “currently only reflect UMH.”

Also that it can be seen in the main buildings of its Sant Joan d’Alacant, Altea and Orihuela campuses, the official name of the University, adding the expression “from Elche”.

But also make visible on the university website, in the headers, publications, signage, etc., the official name of the University, incorporating the initials the “E” for Elche, or the name “Universidad / Universitas Miguel Hernández”, the locative “from Elche”.

This was only one of the four agreements that the municipal plenary of Elche reached on November 29 and that have left a bad taste in the mouth of the Rectorate, from where they regret that the request that emanates from the former dean of Medicine at the UMH Justo Medrano.

And it is that in the institutional declaration it is even affirmed that “despite the formal compliance by the statute of the legal denomination of the University, in successive articles of the statute surreptitiously a series of variations are introduced that have supposed, from the point of view of material view, the denaturalization of the name of the university, eliminating the legal name “de Elche” ».

In this sense, from Plaça de Baix it is stated that article 1 of the statute «makes clear the intention of its editors, by pointing out« the Miguel Hernández University of Elche, from now on “UMH”. In other words, the E of Elche is eliminated from the acronym of the university, when according to Law 2/1996, the correct acronym would be UMHE ».

And even from the City Council the word “mutilate” is used when stating: “Article 3 follows the same line of mutilating the legal name of the university, by configuring in section 3 the content of the University coat of arms: the word “Universitas” and the name “Miguel Hernández” are recorded, eliminating any reference to “Elche”, in breach of law 2/1996 and article 3 of the Statute itself. ”

As a preamble to that request that the University place and add not only the name of Elche to its main buildings that it has on its different campuses and to the web, but also change its statutes to include the name of Elche and the acronym UMHE (even in its coat of arms), the City Council lists in this institutional declaration the «enormous effort» it has made to be able to host the University headquarters in its municipal area.

In this sense, it reminds you that the Elche City Council acquired 687,826 square meters of land for the “UMHE”, with forced expropriations at a cost of more than 39.7 million euros.

It is also noted that the financial collaboration of the City Council «allowed the UMHE Sports Palace to be a more ambitious project, with a capacity for 3,500 spectators and improved facilities “, in addition to pointing out that a building for student residence has recently been assigned to the University.

In any case, in the judgment of the plenary session, the current statutes of the University «fail to comply with Law 2/1996 because it uses the initials UMH instead of UMHE in its entirety, and establishes a shield in which it is called” Universitas Miguel Hernández “in instead of “Universidad Miguel Hernández de Elche” ”, criticisms with which the academic institution itself does not agree, much less and argued this last week.