Ministry of Science supports new teaching concepts at Leuphana

2023-01-10 180,000 euros from the program Innovation plus


Lüneburg. From the program "Innovative teaching and learning concepts: Innovation plus" of the Lower Saxony Ministry of Science and Culture, Leuphana University Lüneburg will receive around 180,000 euros over the next two years to fund four projects. The projects applied for come from the fields of natural sciences, education, mathematics and engineering. Among other things, they are intended to support students at the start of their studies and to further improve the quality of teaching and examinations. Since 2019, almost 20 projects by Leuphana teachers have already been funded under this program.

The project "Digital Competence Acquisition in the Virtual Learning Space" is aimed at student teachers of biology, chemistry, and subject teaching with a reference subject in natural sciences. A team led by Prof. Dr. Simone Abels wants to develop a self-learning module based on freely accessible educational materials. In this way, students will get to know digital teaching media and try them out in a scientific context.

Prof. Dr. Lars Alberth and Dr. Steffi Hobuß want to support students of the Bachelor's programs in Business Education and Social Education in English-language courses with their project "English in Professional Socialization and Professional Culture". This involves a scientific examination of professional educational biographies, social origins and linguistic heterogeneities in schools, as well as accompanying counseling in a consultation format specifically for the requirements of English-language seminars.

The project of a team from the Institute of Mathematics and its Didactics deals with speed limits, heat pumps, electric cars and the mathematical modeling of sustainability. Dr. Robin Göller, Prof. Dr. Michael Besser and Prof. Dr. Kathrin Padberg-Gehle assume that the influence of mathematical modeling is becoming increasingly important for forecasting future events, which also manifests itself in political decisions. Against this background, a seminar concept is to be developed which, using the current example of the CO2 footprint, creates a learning and discussion space for students in order to sensitize them to the importance of mathematical modeling.

In their project, Dr. Brit-Maren Block and Prof. Dr. Paolo Mercorelli want to develop an interlinked, digitally supported holistic study entry phase in the engineering sciences. It is intended to provide sustainable support for individual academic success even before the start of studies and during the first semester. Among other things, a hybrid bridge course is being designed to strengthen the transition from school to university. It will teach the basics of mathematics and electrical engineering as well as introductions to current topics such as energy, e-mobility and sustainability online.

Background:
A total funding volume of EUR 3 million is available for the Innovation plus program. 60 projects from Lower Saxony will benefit from the funding. The selection was made in an expert procedure organized by the Central Evaluation and Accreditation Agency Hanover. The results of the funded projects will be made available on the Lower Saxony portal for Open Educational Resources (OER) Twillo. The application process was technically accompanied and coordinated by the teaching service at Leuphana.

An overview of the teaching projects founded to date can be found here.