and Master Programmes in German Higher Education Institutions

council (2001) indirectly favours disciplinary Master degrees (“Generic Masters”) by questioningwhether interdisciplinary Master degrees (“Hybrid Masters”) qualify for a subsequentPhD. Nevertheless, a significant number of institutional management (between 10and 20% across sectors) describe their Bachelor and Master degrees as predominantly generalistor interdisciplinary in nature. (Technical) universities are more open towards interdisciplinaryprogrammes than are FHs. The TUs stand out with nearly 40% of institutionalmanagement characterising their Bachelor programmes as interdisciplinary. An explanationmight be that TUs have different criteria for classifying a programme as interdisciplinary:adding some social science requirements to a technical degree easily renders a programmeinterdisciplinary.9.3.5 Other key choicesProgramme length. The HRG and KMK regulations leave it up to institutions to choosebetween 3 and 4 year length for the Bachelor and 1 and 2 year length for the Master programmes,as long as the total length, if offered consecutively, does not exceed 5 years. Theconsecutive model, though, is still rare: only a quarter of programmes have been designedsuch that the Master builds on a Bachelor degree offered by the same institution. This contrastswith about 50% of (technical) universities and 30% of FHs reporting that most of theB/M at their institution are (being) designed as consecutive programmes – we might seemore of those programmes in the future (Chapter 4).The great majority of Bachelor programmes (80%) take 3 years – universities have and evenstronger preference for this length (87%) than FHs (65%). One-year Master level programmesare rare. About half of Master programmes take two years. Although this is precludedby the KMK guidelines, a significant number of Master programmes are of 1 ½years’ length. The great number of three year Bachelor programmes offered by FHs indicatesthat these institutions have found a way to reduce the curriculum contents of the Diplom(FH) programme and yet offer a degree that qualifies for the labour market. The majorityof FHs, thus, did not create Bachelor degrees by relabeling the Diplom (FH). The smallnumber of one year Master programmes might indicate that German higher education institutionsstill have problems designing short programmes leading to a useful qualification –the shorter the degree, the greater the need for close co-operation among professors andsubject areas as well as for intense supervision of students (Chapters 3 and 4).Degree of Innovation. At the political level, the introduction of B/M is clearly linked to thehope to promote curricular innovation (Science Council 2000). What about institutions: Dothey use the new degrees for curricular innovation or do they content themselves with theformal implementation of consecutive structures? The answer of institutional managementis clear and displays little variation across sectors: In the vast majority of institutions, B/Mpredominantly draw on existing contents, but with innovation in methodology and structure.However, there is a significant minority (about a quarter) of institutions, in which B/M arepredominantly used to open up new fields of study and new contents. These answers seemrealistic and honest given the fact that institutions can impossibly reinvent their entirecourse supply (Vorlesungsverzeichnis) when introducing B/M, but at the same time usethem selectively to strengthen their profile (Chapter 4).New forms of delivery. So far, only a negligible percentage of B/M are delivered part-time(1%), by distance-learning (1%), and combining working and learning (dual programmes,3%) (Chapter 3). However, across the board, a great number of institutions intend to use the65