Quality Management in Teaching and Studies

The Digital Engineering Faculty, established in April 2017 as a collaboration between the University of Potsdam and the Hasso Plattner Institute, is the first private funded faculty of a public university in Germany. It is also the smallest faculty at the University of Potsdam and will eventually be developed into a university cluster of excellence in digital engineering. Before the faculty was founded, its programs of study were offered by the Faculty of Science. The goals of the Faculty of Science thus lay the foundation for the faculty’s expansion of its quality management.

Teaching plays a prominent role in the faculty’s concept of quality. Each semester, all courses (lectures, seminars, tutorials, and projects) are evaluated. The departmental student committee is tasked with preparing and conducting course evaluations on an exclusively developed platform. Teaching is evaluated according to the lecturer’s levels of motivation, preparation, and accessibility; the presentation of the material; the use of texts; skills-focused design; and compatibility with students’ lives and schedules. In developing each group of questions, the evaluation goals of each lecturer are also considered. After grades have been given, the results are conveyed to the lecturer in personalized form and made available to the students on a website. Additionally, the evaluations are regularly discussed with tutorial assistants, the dean of students, and the administration and considered when designing and updating degree programs. The faculty also makes use of the student questionnaire administered as part of the CHE university rankings. According to these rankings, the Hasso Plattner Institute’s computer science programs have been among the best in Germany for many years.

1. To incorporate students actively in the research process from an early stage.
2. To expand and raise the profile of the courses offered in the context of global requirements in society and the labor market.
3. To establish structures for quality management.