Internationality and internationalization at Leuphana

Leuphana is a modern campus university with an international orientation. It offers attractive research conditions for international scientists and scholars and is popular with international students from all over the world for its diverse English-language study programs, its personal study atmosphere and its lively campus.

Integration into an international network

Leuphana maintains a network of long-standing international collaborations. All members of the university community can benefit from this network in a variety of ways.

  • Leuphana maintains cooperations with more than 150 foreign universities.
    A total of around 860 international students are currently studying with us. At the Graduate School, the proportion of international students is as high as 17%.
  • The International Center oversees and develops the university's international relations. The team provides information about the worldwide exchange and mobility programs. It advises visiting scholars and both local and foreign students and employees who are planning a stay abroad or who are coming to us for a study or research stay.
  • Leuphana is a member of the European University Association (EUA) and the International Association of Universities (IAU). It is also active in many international networks such as the Global Business School Network (GBSN).

Research at an international level

Leuphana produces internationally visible research. Our researchers are involved in international collaborations and are present in the international specialist communities.

  • Three renowned ERC grants have so far been successfully acquired by Leuphana researchers and exemplify the international relevance and charisma of research at Leuphana.
  • The Stanford Ioannidis Ranking shows for the citation year 2021 that 16 Leuphana professors are among the 2 percent of the world's most cited authors in their field, thus demonstrating the international relevance of our research.
  • Prof. Berta Martín-López, Professor of International Sustainable Development and Planning, is among the world's most cited researchers (2019, 2020, 2021, 2022: "Highly Cited Researchers" report by Clarivate Analytic).
  • Prof. Christian Welzel, Professor of Political Culture Research, stands for internationally visible research in political science. He also serves as the current Vice President and former President of the world-renowned World Value Survey.
  • Prof. Michael Frese enriches entrepreneurship research at Leuphana with excellent world-class research.

Strategic partnerships

The university currently maintains strategic partnerships with three international institutions. These partnerships are of outstanding importance for its further development of internationalization in research, studies and teaching.

  • The University of Glasgow is linked to Leuphana through the European Centre for Advanced Studies (ECAS) research center and several double degree programs at the bachelor's and master's level.
  • The City University of Hong Kong and Leuphana jointly offer the double bachelor degree program Digital Media.
  • Leuphana has a long-standing strategic partnership with Arizona State University, which has been reflected in research in the joint research center Center for Global Sustainability and Cultural Transformation and in teaching in the former double master's degree program Global Sustainability Science.

Digital internationalization

Digitization opens up new potential for the internationalization of study and teaching programs. Leuphana uses digital teaching/learning formats strategically to effectively combine digitization and internationalization.

  • Together with Arizona State University, Leuphana developed digital seminar modules for students at both universities and used them in teaching as early as 2011 in the Global Classroom project.
  • In the Digital Transformation Lab for Teaching and Learning (DigiTaL) project, funded by the Innovation in Higher Education Foundation, three subprojects are working on expanding and supporting the internationalization of teaching through innovative digital teaching concepts. To this end, solutions for technical, administrative and didactic challenges are being developed and tested to support teachers in creating digital and international teaching opportunities.
  • The DigiTaL sub-project "Digital teaching/learning formats for the internationalization of the master's and doctoral phases" implements this, for example, by developing and evaluating courses and other pilot formats such as an international, hybrid panel discussion with the objective of systematic internationalization at home.

Learning languages and cultures

For students at Leuphana, the International Center is also a place to learn new languages, refresh existing language skills, get to know new cultures, and build and expand intercultural competencies.

  • Whether Chinese, Spanish, English or German as a foreign language: students can discover and learn more than ten languages at different language levels and in different learning formats.
  • Language tandems among students offer the opportunity to learn languages in partnership and autonomously in mutual exchange, to gain new cultural perspectives and to expand intercultural competencies.
  • In theself-access center, students and staff can, for example, take placement tests, access teaching and learning resources, borrow films in the original language, and exchange ideas with other learners.

Working internationally

Leuphana attracts international researchers and employees who come together on campus and contribute their diverse experiences and competencies to the university community.This diversity also highlights our attractiveness as an employer.

  • Almost 10% of the full-time (academic and non-academic) staff are international colleagues. Among the scientific staff (incl. professors), the figure is even more than 12%.
  • As part of the internal training program, employees have the opportunity to take various language courses and thus expand their language skills.
  • Just like students, employees also benefit from support programs such as Erasmus+ if they want to enrich their personal day-to-day work with international experience: For example, short-term lectureships of scientists at European partner universities or further education and training stays of university staff at host institutions in other European countries can be funded.