NRW receives 85 million euros for innovative university projects!

NRW receives 85 million euros for innovative university projects!

The universities in North Rhine-Westphalia can be happy: the federal and state governments want to promote innovative university teaching with strong funding of 85 million euros. How country.nrw reports, 17 universities benefit from this well-thought-out program, which provides more resources than in other federal states. From October 1, 2025, this funding will be effective for the next six years and is intended to improve student success and implement real innovations in teaching.

But what exactly is planned? The projects are diverse and range from the development of dual study programs at Bielefeld University and the Ostwestfalen-Lippe University of Technology to innovative approaches to teacher training at the Ruhr University Bochum. This funding is a real win-win situation for everyone involved, because the universities were able to submit both individual and joint applications; a total of 80 applications nationwide were successful.

Diverse approaches for innovative teaching

Some of the individual projects are particularly worth mentioning: RWTH Aachen is working on a concept called “RWTH Together University – Teaching. Learning. Doing.”, while Düsseldorf University of Applied Sciences is dedicated to the topic of “Learning in the Makerspace”. The University of Cologne is also well positioned with the “Innovation Platform for Future-Relevant Skills”. w-hs.de also emphasizes that the OERContent.nrw funding line focuses on digital teaching and learning offerings that are modular and adaptive.

In this context, the implementation and dissemination of high-quality concepts is also a central goal. The coming projects should not only be innovative, but also curricularly secured and integrated into the future state portal DH.NRW. This creates a network of subject-specific and course-specific digital courses that benefit students.

Digital transformation in higher education

Digitalization brings a breath of fresh air to higher education. Because new technologies are not only changing the world of work, but also the way students learn and teachers teach. bmbf.de describes the goals that are being pursued with this digital transformation: individualization, flexibility and mobility in teaching are the key words here. Artificial intelligence (AI) in particular opens up new ways to make higher education more open and fair.

Platforms like KI-Campus already offer free online courses to give students the necessary digital skills. The University Forum for Digitalization is another key player that connects universities, politics and business in order to actively shape the digital transformation.

With all of these measures, the universities in North Rhine-Westphalia are well equipped to steer innovatively into the future. It remains exciting to see how these projects develop and what the students will ultimately benefit from them.