In its current "Recommendations on further education in higher education as part of lifelong learning", the German Council of Science and Humanities recommends the expansion of further education programmes. Demographic change as well as technological and social changes mean that initial training and studies are often no longer sufficient for an entire working life. Instead, new knowledge and additional skills need to be acquired again and again.
"Universities are not only responsible for initial training. They also have the task of providing specialists with further academic training after they have completed their first degree," says Martina Brockmeier, Chair of the German Council of Science and Humanities. These students have different demands on the management of studies because they are usually employed. For working people, there should also be more undergraduate degree programmes that can be used for further education - be it part-time, part-time or as distance learning programmes. "Our recommendations should enable universities to meet the demand for further education faster and better," says Brockmeier.
Further education has long been a statutory task of universities, but in an international comparison, Germany lags far behind when it comes to offering such programmes at state universities. The German Council of Science and Humanities blames this on a number of framework conditions. "In order to strengthen universities as places of lifelong learning, we need to adapt the legal framework, find good forms of organisation and support and include the task of further education in the development planning of universities," says Brockmeier, summarising the tenor of the recommendations.
In most Federal States, universities have to charge cost-covering fees for their continuing education programmes and make elaborate separation calculations. Students often opt for consecutive and fee-free degree programmes instead of fee-based further education courses. In some cases, employers contribute to the fees, in others this is unusual. The German Council of Science and Humanities recommends that higher education further education programmes should be financed in the long term by a consistent model in which individuals, employers and the state participate together. In academic appointments of particular public interest, universities should be able to offer more tuition-free or reduced-fee programmes in the future.
The German Council of Science and Humanities also proposes an increase in university staff to ensure a broad expansion of flexible study formats in terms of time and location. This should make further education at universities more compatible with employment or family commitments in the future. Teaching in further education should be possible as a main or part-time job. Up to now, teaching staff have often not been able to work full-time, even though they have to take on the time-consuming initiation and development work in addition to teaching. Universities should bundle services for teachers and students, counselling and study programmes in further education and make them more accessible to outsiders. Employers should also make more intensive use of the continuing education programmes offered by universities for their personnel development.
Prof. Dr Anke Hanft, Professor of Advanced Scientific Training at the University of Oldenburg and Scientific Director of the Centre for Lifelong Learning (C3L), was appointed by the German Council of Science and Humanities as an expert to the working group "Qualification of skilled workers against the backdrop of demographic change". Since 2017, the committee has been dealing with the establishment, expansion and further development of higher education continuing education programmes for experienced students with and without previous academic qualifications. With the "Recommendations on further education in higher education as part of lifelong learning", the German Council of Science and Humanities is presenting the fourth and final part of a series of recommendations dealing with the qualification of skilled workers against the backdrop of demographic change. The previous partial recommendations are dedicated to the relationship between academic and vocational education (2014), higher education and the labour market (2015) and universities and migration (2016).
The version of the recommendations on further education in higher education as part of lifelong learning adopted by the German Council of Science and Humanities is available for download at the following address: