HIGHER EDUCATION

Boost for german universities proposed

A plan to pump an extra euro 1.25bn into Germany's top five universities to help them compete on the international research stage has been revamped after complaints from state ministers. The initial plan, which was unveiled by research minister Edelgard Bulmahn at the end of January, was to give the top five universities an extra euro 50m a year from federal coffers between 2006 and 2010. But state ministers, who have responsibility for German universities, felt that the federal government was meddling in their affairs. They also argued that it would be fairer to reward individual departments, rather than entire universities.

Federal and state officials have now agreed a compromise plan that will see the extra cash distributed to more than just the top five universities, although they will still have to bid for the funds in an open competition, as planned. In addition, new graduate schools will be set up to train young researchers and individual departments will be grouped into "clusters of excellence". Undergraduate curricula will also be revamped so that students take a three-year bachelors degree followed by an optional two-year masters course. This model, which is slowly becoming the norm, was first agreed by European research ministers at Bologna in 1999.

Jürgen Mlynek, the physicist who is president of Humboldt University in Berlin, welcomes the compromise. "The new plan is a step in the right direction to make German universities more competitive and more visible at the international level," he says. "But I hope that the federal and state governments come up with the details soon. There is no time to lose."

Knut Urban, president of the German Physical Society, is also pleased that federal and state officials have managed to compromise. However, he thinks that more still needs to be done. "A sustainable improvement of our international competitiveness can only be achieved if we also strengthen the autonomy of German universities and cut the paralyzing bureaucracy in research and teaching."

Federal and state officials are now devising the rules by which the universities, clusters and graduate schools will be selected next year. It is also possible that individual states may also contribute extra cash. A final plan will be presented to the government by June, when chancellor Gerhard Schröder meets state prime ministers.

Georg Wolschin
Heidelberg, Germany

Siehe Physics World 05(2004) für den redigierten Artikel.

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