Internationality in teaching and research is a requirement for a high-performing university. Making this quality, and thus competitiveness, visible at national and international level is an important goal of internationalisation for the University of Greifswald. Accordingly, international marketing for the university and its research as well as international student recruitment measures are to be expanded. Likewise, digitisation, which will decisively change all structures and processes at the university in the coming years, will be used profitably to enhance the internationalisation of teaching and research.
The last time the Rectorate of the University of Greifswald developed strategies and measures for internationalisation was in 2016, and work began on a new internationalisation strategy in 2021. To this end, a committee and five groups of experts defined elements of the new internationalisation strategy from August to December 2021. The drafts developed from this were discussed in February and March 2022 by the University’s management and in committees belonging to the faculties and the student body. The final results are the Strategy Paper, describing the strategic goals until 2030, an Action Plan comprising selected specific measures until 31 March 2025, and a Catalogue of Measures in which all identified needs and implementation options were recorded.
An important concern during the development of the new strategy was to focus on all areas of the university and to develop specific measures for each of them: for the core tasks of teaching and study, research and third mission and for the cross-sectional tasks of partnership, mobility and language policy, internationalisation@home, as well as for the university's administration. The areas are sustained by the university members that represent them. Accordingly, all university members have been and will be involved, be it the globally connected and successful academics, the internationally active teachers and students, or the linguistically and interculturally trained administrative staff. The international work at the university thrives on the internal promoters and contact persons, as well as the external experts in equal measure.
Specific goals of the new Internationalisation Strategy are:
Studies and Teaching: The range of classes taught in English for exchange students is to be expanded and made more visible. Likewise, more English-language study programmes are to be established and existing offers shall be developed further.
Research: A targeted partnership policy should enable both the university-wide prioritisation along the key fields of research and the research interest areas of the university as well as individual, subject-driven cooperation.
Mobility and Language Policy: The focus shall be placed on English as the lingua franca, with simultaneous use of other languages and general support of multilingualism.
Internationalisation@home: Through international encounters on campus - also in cooperation with non-university institutions - the cosmopolitanism and diversity of the university, the town of Greifswald and the region will be brought to life.
Internationalisation remains a joint project and will continue to be accompanied by all members of the university community. Summer semester of 2022 already saw a Rectorate Forum Campus Internationalisation [de] on the university-wide implementation of the internationalisation strategy. The Lunchtalk.digital [de] series, which is fundamentally dedicated to the further development of teaching, will also focus on the internationalisation of teaching and study in the summer semester of 2022.
Further Information
Internationalisation at the University of Greifswald
Contact at the University of Greifswald
Dorthe G. A. Hartmann, M. A.
Pro-Rector for Teaching, Teacher Training and Internationalisation
Domstraße 11, Entrance 2, 17489 Greifswald
Tel.: +49 3834 420 1163
prorektorin-lehreuni-greifswaldde