DIES International Deans' Course
News
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Projekt Overview
German Academic Exchange Service
The German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) is a self-governing organisation of German institutions of higher education and is the world’s largest funding organization for international academic exchange. The DAAD—which has responsibilities in the fields of foreign cultural and education policy, development policy and national higher education policy—runs a large number of educational activities to inform members about new trends and developments in the preparation of scholars and staff from tertiary institutions for the challenges internationalization brings institutions.
German Rectors' Conference
The German Rectors’ Conference (HRK) is a voluntary association of state and state-recognized universities and other higher education institutions in Germany. The HRK is the political and public voice of the universities and other higher education institutions and is the forum for the higher education institutions’ joint opinion-forming process. The HRK addresses all topics relating to the responsibilities of higher education institutions, one of them being international higher education cooperation. In its work, it deals extensively with the challenges of managing higher education institutions.
Osnabrück University of Applied Sciences
The Osnabrück University of Applied Sciences, a medium-sized tertiary institution in the northern part of Germany, offers a wide variety of bachelor and master programs. In 2004, it began to offer an MBA program “Higher Education and Research Management,” becoming one of the key tertiary education institutions to offer programs that give students both the theoretical and practical know-how to manage higher education institutions. Through the IDC, The Osnabrück University of Applied Sciences has extended its reach beyond Germany's borders and is offering training in higher education management in an international context.
Centre for Higher Education
The Centre for Higher Education (CHE), a think tank focusing on developments in higher education and jointly funded by the Bertelsmann Foundation and the German Rectors’ Conference, presents new ideas and concepts for higher education to the public and expert community. CHE, well known for their influential university ranking of German, Austrian and Swiss higher education institutions, offers numerous training programmes for tertiary institutions.
Alexander von Humboldt Foundation
The Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (AvH) is a major German organization facilitating international academic relations through cooperation between outstanding foreign and German researchers. The AvH offers research fellowships, research awards and special programs for alumni and organizes many major meetings in Germany for scholarship holders.
Freie Universität Berlin
Freie Universität Berlin is a leading research institution. It is one of the German universities successful in all three funding lines in the federal and state Excellence Initiative, thereby receiving additional funding for its institutional future development strategy. Freie Universität thus stakes out a place as an international network university in the global competition among universities.
International Partners
Six partner institutions from Africa and Asia are currently involved in the program:
- Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia, Taita Taveta University, Voi, Kenya, and University of the Western Cape, South Africa are co-organizers of the DIES International Deans’ Course for African participants.
- Centro Escolar University Manila, Philippines, Gadjah Mada University, Indonesia and Multimedia University, Malaysia are co-organizers of the program for Asian participants.
Implementation of the International Deans’ Course takes place in four stages covering a period of more than a year. The structure is based on the idea that the complex skills required in managing higher education institutions cannot be meaningfully discussed, imparted nor developed in just one session, which by design is limited to the absorbtion of information. Realizing fundamental, long-term change in this field is a process that takes time, requires joint reflection and needs to be broken down into phases capable of addressing case-specific problems and incorporating inputs, adapting strategies when necessary.
About 15 countries were identified to participate in the International Deans’ Course. Instead of accepting only one or two participants from each country, it was decided to divide the program into two alternating rounds: In its first year, the course would host participants from Africa, and the next year would feature participants from Asia. While the exchange of experiences between Africa and Asia would have yielded its own benefits, sharing among African participants and among Asian participants respectively was felt to be more constructive because it allows the exchange of experiences and best practices among more similar universities, countries and tertiary education systems.
The IDC was designed in such a way that each participant identifies a specific project he or she would work on in the months after the first training. It was reasoned that this would provide an opportunity to think about the applicability of methods and tools learned in their own academic environment. These "Personal Action Plans" will be explained in greater detail below.
Step 1: Workshops in Osnabrueck and Berlin
The first stage of the course aims to introduce important new concepts in higher education management. Participants are sensitized to new ideas and issues, contemporary forces of change and potentially relevant solutions already tested in Germany, in other European countries and around the world. At the end of this first stage in Germany, participants are requested to identify an issue that they will work on for the following months in the framework of a “personal action plan” (PAP). In the identification of this project, participants are applying newly required ideas and skills to their own individual working environments. This approach allows for a more active and relevant application of the ideas, concepts and theories introduced during the course and reduces the typical divergence of seminar content and professional reality. Progress on the personal action plans is shared regularly with other participants throughout the duration of the International Deans’ Course.
Step 2: Regional Workshops
The second stage entails a meeting of participants from the same country or region, joined by an expert from Germany, taking place a few months after the first stage in Germany. This meeting provides an opportunity to discuss progress on the participants' personal action plans and experiences of higher education management in general, utilizing the other expert participants in the DIES International Deans’ Course as resources. Participants have the chance to share milestones as well as roadblocks, allowing for joint reflection on forces hindering change and an opportunity to exchange views on potential alternatives. The meeting is characterized by intense discussion among participants, who, being drawn exclusively from the deans’ course, already know each other and have had the chance to develop mutual senses of trust and understanding. This creates a unique atmosphere, which is important for deliberation on comprehensive strategies of change and for getting to the heart of issues and matters. The regional meeting is a public forum where important issues in higher education are addressed. Topics selected for this open forum are quality management, change of governance and strategic management, among others.
Step 3: The Final Workshop
After an additional working period of approximately nine months, the third stage brings together all participants of the DIES International Deans’ Course to conclude with a final workshop. Successful personal action plans are utilized as casestudies, and remaining challenges are reassessed. Participants have a final opportunity to take advantage of expert resources in the field under the auspices of the International Deans' Course and to set up a professional network to last a career long. New input is provided, change processes are jointly reflected upon and lessons learned are discussed. This all contributes to the planning of future efforts.
Step 4: Follow up
There is an important follow-up to the DIES International Deans’ Course, the intraregional and inter-regional networking of participants. The DAAD specifically supports initiatives linking course participants to participants in other DAAD-activities related to higher education management and other relevant fields. And, many participants use their experiences and old or newly established contacts at German higher education institutions to identify joint projects, exchange information or to establish other forms of cooperation. The participants have access to various programs explicitly designed to place DAAD alumni in contact with each other and with other scholars in Germany.
- The program provides knowledge to participants from African and Asian countries on fundamental changes in higher education in Germany, Europe and in other regions that have potential relevance to the challenges facing their own institutions.
- Participants gain an insight into new thinking about management of higher education institutions that might help them to improve the performance of their institutions.
- The program gives participants practical skills to respond to changes in higher education in their own working environment by using the practical learning approach.
- The program builds bridges between higher education institutions in Africa, Asia and in Germany, enabling all sides to utilize knowledge about each other in further efforts in teaching, research and administration.
- The program assists persons who have studied in Germany and have come to occupy leadership roles in African and Asian higher education institutions.
Contact
Project Director
Dr. Kai Handel
Faculty of Business Management and Social Sciences
University of Applied Sciences Osnabrueck, Germany
Phone: +49
E-mail: k.handel(at)hs-osnabrueck.de
DIES Coordinator
Yvonne Visarius
Higher Education Management Programmes (DIES)
German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), Germany
Phone: +49 (0) 228 / 882-163
E-mail: visarius(at)daad.de
Project Administration
Alexander Rupp
Faculty of Business Management and Social Sciences
University of Applied Sciences Osnabrueck, Germany
Phone: +49 (0) 541 / 969-3210
E-mail: a.rupp(at)hs-osnabrueck.de
Freya Gallenkamp
Faculty of Business Management and Social Sciences
University of Applied Sciences Osnabrueck, Germany
Phone: +49 (0) 541 / 969-2866
E-mail: f.gallenkamp(at)hs-osnabrueck.de