13 additional professorships for the University of Kassel - success in the federal-state program

The President of the University of Kassel, Prof. Dr. Reiner Finkeldey, stated: "This is very excellent news for the University of Kassel. With this support, we are giving a major boost to the tenure track as an important option for young scientists at our university. We will benefit greatly from the program to promote the careers of many high-caliber young scientists. The additional professorships will help us build our profile, while at the same time our students will benefit from the additional teaching opportunities and improved supervision. We are very pleased that our university has received this commitment. It speaks to the strength of our concept and the future potential of our university."

The additional professorships can be established as of December 1, 2019. They will be funded for a maximum of ten years as part of the federal-state program to promote young scientists. In its application, the University of Kassel had requested funding for 13 additional professorships that will strengthen existing or planned focal points in various departments, for example in empirical education research, Latin American research or materials science. In addition to the requested funding, the university intends to spend substantial own funds in order to be able to offer appropriate conditions for the new professorships. "We want the new professors to be able to make the most of their performance potential as quickly as possible," Finkeldey said.

The funding process designed by the federal and state governments aims to establish a total of 1,000 "tenure track" professorships at the universities receiving funding. Tenure track" refers to the possibility of initially filling professorships on a temporary basis. If a subsequent evaluation is positive, the person receives the professorship for life. The aim of the funding program is to establish the tenure track model structurally and at the same time to permanently increase the number of professorships at German universities. The 'cultural change' associated with this funding is intended to help make the career prospects of young scientists more predictable and transparent, thereby increasing the attractiveness and competitiveness of the German science system as a whole.

The University of Kassel has created conceptual and formal framework conditions with a personnel development concept, the introduction of regulations for the establishment and evaluation of tenure-track professorships, and the concretization of the statutes for the tenure-track procedure in advance of the application process. In this way, it was able to convince the selection committee that it has significantly advanced the conditions for promoting young scientists overall in recent years and is now also ready for tenure-track professorships on a larger scale.  

Contact:

Sebastian Mense
University of Kassel
Communications, Press and Public Relations
Tel.: +49 561 804-1961
E-mail: presse[at]uni-kassel[dot]de
www.uni-kassel.de