Higher Education Policy: Parties' Plans   [09.03.21]

Better student support in the face of Covid-19 disadvantages, advancing digitalization, a climate-neutral campus by 2040, and strengthening innovation and knowledge transfer: All of these topics are hot topics for Baden-Württemberg's universities. After all, they cost money that the universities are currently lacking. In neighboring Bavaria, an additional 400 million euros are now being made available annually for the modernization of universities and colleges as part of a high-tech agenda. What can be expected in Baden-Württemberg? In the run-up to the state elections, the presidents asked the parties what they wanted to know. Under the title "Wahlprüfsteine für die Landtagswahl 2021," the State Rectors' Conference submitted a list of questions to the Green Party, the CDU, the SPD, and the FDP.

The State Rectors' Conference has published the parties' answers on its homepage (in German).

 

Overview: Questions of the State Rectors' Conference

Election touchstones for the 2021 state elections

 

1. Student support

During the Covid pandemic, current first-year students have become acquainted with universities almost exclusively digitally. This will foreseeably have a negative impact on student success. To ensure successful studies, better support is now critical. Starting in the fall of 2021, there will be an increased number of first-year students coming to universities whose educational foundations have suffered as a result of the pandemic, so they will need additional support. This has a particularly negative impact at universities compared with universities of applied sciences because the support ratio at universities is significantly worse. There is an urgent need for action here. The good student-teacher ratios at HAWs must also become the standard at universities.

a) Is your party in favor of better student support at the universities by bringing the support ratio into line with that at the HAWs? Is your party prepared to provide the necessary additional resources for adequate funding?

b) Is your party in favor of special programs to provide intensive support and assistance by universities for groups disadvantaged by the pandemic?

 

2. Digitalization

Universities have made progress in the digitalization of teaching since March 2020 that was not thought possible before the pandemic. In order to be able to continue on the path of digitalization in a consistent and structured manner for all of their areas, i.e., including science support services and research, while maintaining their character as on-site universities, they have proposed a comprehensive package of measures based on the work of a high-level group of experts. According to this, a total of 100 million euros per year must be securely invested in the core areas of the universities in the years 2021-26, with at least half of the sum required on a permanent basis beyond this time.

Will you implement the package of measures proposed by the universities and provide the necessary funding?

 

3. Climate-neutral campus

The indispensable basis of a climate-neutral university and college system is energy-efficient university buildings that are both sustainable and functionally adequate. However, these only exist in isolated cases in Baden-Württemberg. With the current annual financial scope of the renovation programs, the outdated existing buildings will still be far from climate-neutral in 2040. At the same time, the often dilapidated building structures hinder top-level research and teaching.

a) Will a state government with the participation of your party decisively modernize university construction - also with regard to the organization of building administration - and ensure that university buildings are only constructed and renovated sustainably in the future?

b) To what extent will you provide additional renovation and replacement funds per year so that universities can become climate-neutral by 2040 (or earlier)?

4. Innovation and transfer

How and where do innovations originate? Universities are in principle the genuine place to discover or develop new things, to track down and understand structures. Translation and transfer are an essential part of innovation. With regard to organizational structures, the universities see a need for improvement.

a) What measures and what financial and human resources will your party use to support spin-offs? What priorities will it set?

b) Will your party support research on the transformation of society with targeted programs, particularly with regard to climate change, health, energy, mobility, production, digitalization, and communication? If so, to what extent?

 

5. Replacement of funds used for sales tax

Cross-university collaboration in the field of science will be largely subject to sales tax in the future. The requirements of European law hit universities with their diverse cooperation and exchange relationships particularly hard, so they will in all likelihood have to pay many millions a year in additional sales tax to the state.

Will a state government with the participation of your party increase the state subsidy to the universities in such a way that the sales tax burden is balanced out, i.e. that the universities do not suffer any financial disadvantages as a result of the new sales tax legislation?

 

To the parties' answers (in German)