09.01.2009
New Duale Hochschule

As of this year, models for integrating work and academics will enjoy a higher status in Baden-Württemberg than in any other federal state in Germany. The Universities of Cooperative Education are already extremely successful in south-west Germany and, as of March 1 2009, they will merge as part of the new Duale Hochschule Baden-Württemberg (Baden-Württemberg Cooperative State University) based in Stuttgart. The existing Universities of Cooperative Education will continue to operate from their eight locations. The relevant law came into force on January 1 2009. The chairman of the founding board of the Duale Hochschule Baden-Württemberg is the mathematician and former Rector of the Universität Ulm, Prof. Dr. Hans Wolff.

“The prospects for the Cooperative State University are very rosy, not just in Germany but in other countries as well,” Professor Wolff commented on the outlook for the new higher education institution. The 21,000 students currently enrolled in the region’s Universities of Cooperative Education will in future be able to graduate with a 3-year practice-based bachelor’s degree which will qualify them to embark on a master’s degree at any other university in Germany. The Duale Hochschule Baden-Württemberg also plans to offer masters degrees itself in the medium term.

The Universities of Cooperative Education are so successful that around 90 per cent of graduates are already under contract to their new employees by the time they complete their 3-year degrees. What makes these institutions of higher education so unique is that their students are able to work for a company while they study and to earn around 800 euros a month in the process. Universities of Cooperative Education are regarded as talent incubators for up-and-coming engineering, business school and social science graduates who profit from the equal emphasis given in their training to theory and practice. Work-based degree courses are supported by around 7,500 companies in Baden-Württemberg – including some of the region's best known corporations – in many cases with substantial financial funding. Among the most successful graduates are managers and directors working for IBM and Daimler, the managing director of the Island of Mainau’s huge tourism company, the Countess Bettina Bernadotte, and politicians such as the former Minister of State in Gerhard Schröder’s government, Hans-Martin Bury.

www.die-duale-hochschule-kommt.de