The Department of Educational Science is part of the Faculty of Human Sciences at the University of Potsdam, which was founded in 1992. The orientation of the department is empirical-quantitative with a focus on the school education sector. The department’s research investigates central challenges in the educational context against the backdrop of individual, institutional and systemic characteristics. These include the significance of educational inequalities and how to deal with them adaptively in the educational context, the professional development of teachers and the development of innovative and effective technology-enhanced teaching and learning scenarios. In line with the Leibniz Association’s motto theoria cum praxi, the department’s profile is oriented towards a use-inspired basic research agenda, in which scientific insights and social benefit are closely linked. Accordingly, members of the department are heavily involved in shaping the dialog between science, educational practice and educational policy. In teaching, the department is responsible for educational science courses in teacher training. In addition, a separate Bachelor’s degree course and, from winter semester 2024 and 2025 respectively, two Master’s degree courses with different specializations (digital education, educational psychology and educational research) are offered.
Important work and offers:
- Several professorships in the department are active in various project networks and in the transfer office in the BMBF-funded Kompetenzverbund lernen:digital. The project management including the office of the transfer office are located at the department.
- Several professorships in the department cooperate with representatives of the Leibniz Institutes as part of the BMBF large-scale projects “Schule macht stark” and “Leistung macht Schule”.
- One of the department’s professor is a member of the “Science of Intelligence” Cluster of Excellence of the Berlin university alliance.
- Several professors are involved as lecturers in the IMPRS Research School LIFE, which is supported by the Max Planck Institute for Human Development Berlin and three international universities.
- The department is committed to the transfer of knowledge and evidence-based policy advice at regional and national level. This includes memberships in the scientific advisory board of the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport of the State of Brandenburg, in the committees of the Institute for School Quality of the States of Berlin and Brandenburg e.V., in the scientific advisory board of the steering group “Determining the performance of the education system in international comparison” and in the German UNESCO Education Committee.
