Awards and funding opportunities for teaching

University Teaching Award

The University Teaching Award, presented by the University of Freiburg, honours outstanding achievements in teaching. The University Teaching Award is presented annually and is endowed with 10,000 euros, which can be divided among several award winners.

Seal of the University of Freiburg on a wall.

Honouring outstanding teaching at the University
of Freiburg

Teachers receive the University Teaching Award in recognition of their outstanding performance. The prize money associated with the award can be used by the award winners for teaching purposes (teaching development, teaching quality, teaching improvement) at the University of Freiburg. In addition to the additional opportunities for shaping teaching, the University Teaching Award is a flagship and proof of the high quality of the award winners’ teaching.

How does one receive the University Teaching Award?

University teaching awards can be presented for individual outstanding courses, good teaching that has been recognised over many years and for innovative teaching concepts. When selecting the award winners, attention is paid to a high level of content and didactics as well as innovative teaching concepts. The right to nominate candidates for the University Teaching Award lies with the faculties’ study commissions and the students, represented either by the student councils or by groups of at least ten students. All lecturers can be nominated for their teaching at the University of Freiburg. The permanent Senate Commission on Academic Affairs decides on the selection of the award winners. The award ceremony takes place at the opening of the academic year in October.

Detailed information on the application procedures and an overview of the University’s major teaching awards can be found on the University’s main pages.

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State Teaching Award

The successful applications for the University Teaching Award usually also result in nominations for the Baden-Württemberg State Teaching Award, which is awarded every two years.

Learn more [de]

Funding programme “Freiraum”

Ideas for teaching can be developed and tested as part of the “Freiraum” funding programme of the “Stiftung Innovation in der Hochschullehre” (“Innovation in University Teaching” foundation). There is no thematic or subject-specific focus. The programme supports projects that are convincing due to their innovative potential. “Freiraum” is a recurring call for proposals. This means that the foundation’s project selection committee selects projects at regular intervals (usually annually).

Learn more [de]

Nahaufnahme von Händen einer Studierenden bei der Texteingabe an einem Laptop im Hörsaal

For more information and advice

The Department of Teaching Strategy and Digitalisation team can advise you on questions relating to the University Teaching Award, the State Teaching Award and the ‘Freiraum’ funding programme.

To the contact persons