Fields of activity

| Higher Education

| Research Policy

| Evaluation

| University Investments and Accreditation

| Medicine

The Wissenschaftsrat advises on matters of organisation of the higher education system in Germany and regularly produces recommendations concerning its systematic development. In particular, this is done particularly with regard to universities and universities of applied sciences, but also covers new forms of higher education institution and areas of tertiary education on the margins of the academic system, such as universities of cooperative education (Berufsakademien). The science policy recommendations issued by the Wissenschaftsrat are based on a comprehensive analysis and assessment of the overall societal framework, the differentiation of the higher education system, and socioeconomic and demographic developments. They also systematically include an internationally comparative perspective.

In the past years, the Wissenschaftsrat considered, from various angles, issues concerning the personnel structure at universities. The main focus here was on the qualification pathways and employment prospects for young researchers and academics, i.e. appointment processes, gender equality and the introduction of junior professorships. With its recommendation to establish professorships with an express focus on teaching, the Wissenschaftsrat advocates further differentiation of the academic staff structure, which should reflect a fundamental appreciation and quality enhancement of academic teaching and the creation of a new teaching culture.

The recommendations of the Wissenschaftsrat also relate to the arrangement of university courses, ranging from aspects such as part-time studies and lifelong learning, through basic structural issues (e.g. the introduction of new course structures and degrees, the future structure of teacher training or the reform of state exams), to subjects like access to higher education or the relationship between higher education and the employment system.

The Wissenschaftsrat issues statements concerning the organisation, funding and appraisal of public-sector research on a regular basis, considering research at the universities and at non-university research institutions as well as its relations to other areas of society, such as the private-sector economy. This thematic field also includes analyses and recommendations on the structure and development of selected fields of science and the humanities (most recently the theologies and sciences concerned with religions, the humanities and agricultural sciences). Apart from that, the Wissenschaftsrat has reported on a number of funding programs of the DFG and other funding organisations.

Starting from a critical assessment of widely used rankings, the Wissenschaftsrat is conducting a pilot study for a novel, discipline-specific, comparative appraisal process, referred to as research rating. This study is accompanied by an examination of the conditions for, and consequences of performance-led governance.

As another of its regular tasks, the Wissenschaftsrat produces reports and recommendations on large research infrastructures of national or international significance. Apart from issuing funding recommendations concerning individual infrastructure projects, the Wissenschaftsrat has developed processes for the prioritisation of such projects. Lately, the commission in charge has prepared recommendations on the future development of the German fleet of ocean-going research vessels which were adopted by the Wissenschaftsrat in November 2010.

All the topics mentioned so far have an international dimension, which is taken into account in the recommendations of the Wissenschaftsrat. Beyond that, the Wissenschaftsrat offers advice regarding European and international research policies and produces recommendations on Germany’s stance in the evolving international contexts.

One of the core activities of the Wissenschaftsrat is to carry out evaluations. All evaluation tasks assigned to the Wissenschaftsrat are controlled by the Evaluation Committee, and implemented by working groups appointed by it.

The Evaluation Committee primarily deals with institutional evaluations. Apart from these, it conducts cross-sectional reviews of individual research areas, structural analyses of individual subjects or subject groups, as well as system evaluations, the latter in connection with institutional evaluations.

In recent years, the main tasks were the evaluation of all federal institutions with R&D responsibilities and a review of research institutions of national significance, with the aim to arrive at recommendations for their inclusion in joint federal and Länder funding (WGL, Leibniz Association). The Wissenschaftsrat has adopted a second comprehensive recommendation for the future development of research institutions supporting the federal government departments in November 2010.

Also in the field of evaluations, the Wissenschaftsrat produces institution-specific reports on research infrastructures. Working groups appointed for this purpose are presently preparing recommendations on the libraries’ network systems in Germany, the infrastructures in the social sciences and humanities, and the scientific collections at universities and science museums.

Finally, within the evaluation department, data concerning the length of studies at universities and universities of applied sciences and on the distribution of examination grades are compiled, processed and published on a regular basis. Based on these empirical data, the Wissenschaftsrat identifies structural changes in the system of higher education and science and derives recommendations on the development of higher education, science and research.

As a result of the Federalism Reform, the funding of university buildings, including medical schools, ceased to be a joint task of federal and Länder administrations as of December 31, 2006, and became the exclusive responsibility of the Länder. At the same time, by introducing funding of research construction projects including large-scale facilities of national significance, the federal and Länder administrations established a new, jointly-funded instrument for investments in the higher education sector (Section 91b subsection 1 sentence 1 no. 3 GG).

In this area, it is the responsibility of the Wissenschaftsrat to issue recommendations concerning the funding of such projects. These recommendations are drafted in the Research Construction Committee. On request of the Länder, the Wissenschaftsrat is also going to report on important investments in the higher education sector by the Länder, through a facultative process.

A special coordinating committee was appointed for the procurement and use of supercomputers for universities and non-university research institutions.

Since January 2001, the Wissenschaftsrat has been conducting the institutional accreditation of non state-run universities. Institutional accreditation is a quality assurance process intended to determine if a non-state higher education institution is capable to provide services in teaching and research which meet established scientific and academic standards. The Wissenschaftsrat thus fulfils a regulatory function for the admission of individual institutions to the higher education system. The main purpose of this process, beside ensuring the scientific quality of non state-run higher education institutions, is to protect their students as well as private and public institutions as future employers of their graduates. So far, 81 accreditation or rejection statements for private higher education institutions have been issued.

Close monitoring of the development of medicine at the universities in the German Länder is among the traditional tasks of the Wissenschaftsrat. With its review and analysis of the medical faculties and university hospitals in Germany, the Wissenschaftsrat provides important indicators, both for the Länder and for the institutions inspected in the process, towards more efficiency in the balancing act between biomedical research, teaching and patient care. The advice given by the Wissenschaftsrat explicitly covers the aspects of scientific orientation, structure, construction requirements and other resources for university medicine.

The process to make the university hospitals legally independent and have their management guided by private-sector practices began at the end of the 1990s. Since then, the Wissenschaftsrat has been monitoring the effects of the new organisational structures and rules on university affairs, especially research and teaching. For instance, the Wissenschaftsrat published several reports on the models of cooperation between universities, their medical faculties and the associated university hospitals. It also examined existing cooperations between university medicine and private-sector companies and defined appropriate, basic rules for such partnerships. In this respect, too, the central aim is to secure the freedoms of research and teaching in competition with the demands of patient care.

Recently the Wissenschaftsrat approved the foundation of the European Medical School Oldenburg-Groningen as an international cooperation of the University of Oldenburg and the University of Groningen striking new paths in medical education.

Apart from that, based on field data and analyses, the Wissenschaftsrat develops recommendations on the structure and future development of specific medical disciplines.