Internationaler, besser, anders? - Bibliothek der Friedrich-Ebert ...

TOWARDS A GLOBALLy ACTIVE
UNIVERSITy
Dr. Nina Lemmens Leiterin der Abteilung Internationalisierung und
Kommunikation, DAAD
Towards a globally active university
When Marei John-Ohnesorg, our kind organiser of today’s conference, and
I discussed my short presentation and what she suggested me to dwell on,
she left me with a big question. She said: „When we look at the Excellence
Initiative, at all the efforts that are made regarding the internationalisation
of our universities, at the discussion about globalisation – shouldn’t we maybe
pause for a moment and wonder: Why are we doing all this? What is the
purpose, the overarching aim of all the reforms, changes and struggles we are
undertaking?“
Well, that is what I call a question!
So let me be brief and brave and cut right to the heart of the discussion
that is for some time now being lead in the realm of „internationalisation“
– the first word in today’s conference’s headline. I think some aspects of
this discussion can also be transferred to the discussion about the future
of any system „measuring“ excellence, be it our German Excellence Initiative
or the British Research Assessment Exercise, the RAE (or the new
Research Excellence Framework, REF), or in fact the different famous and
infamous rankings that are regularly rocking our world.
When some of the experts claimed that we have reached the „End of internationalisation“,
what they really were saying was that we need to look at
internationalisation not as the final aim of our efforts, but as a means to
reach an overarching goal. Internationalisation and all its facets are tools,
and very important ones – the mobility of students, the exchange of researchers
and their ideas, the intercultural awareness towards colleagues
and partners on our campuses, the influence of university teachers from
abroad on the curriculum and teaching culture of our universities, the
joint study programmes and research projects, the strategic partnerships
etc. One could call the Excellence Initiative a „tool“, too: an instrument to
force our universities to sharpen their own specific profiles, to concentrate
on their respective strengths and overcome their weaknesses, to gain
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