German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD)

Tasks and Funding

The DAAD is a joint association of the German institutions of higher education. Its task is to promote academic relations with other countries, particularly exchanges between students and researchers. It is the internationalization agency of the German institutions of higher education and at the same time an intermediary organization for Germany's foreign, European, development and higher education policy.

Its primary objectives within the remit of the BMBF include:

• training young, up-and-coming German researchers and leaders at the best institutions in the world in the spirit of tolerance and cosmopolitanism,
• promoting the international character and attractiveness of German institutions of higher education and drawing top-class talent from abroad.

Its other objectives are to:

• interest talented young foreigners in studying or conducting research in Germany and keeping these people as partners throughout their entire lives,
• maintain and establish an appropriate place for German language, literature and cultural studies at important universities abroad,
• help the developing countries in the South and the reform states in the East to establish efficient higher education structures.

These objectives take concrete form in over 250 programmes which are financed for the most part by public funding from the Federal Government. As a rule, the programmes are open to all academic disciplines and all countries and to both German citizens and foreigners. In addition, the DAAD supports the international activities of the institutions of higher education by providing a number of services. These include information and publication programmes, marketing, counselling and support services and programmes which are aimed at the stronger internationalization and world-wide attractiveness of German institutions of higher education. Finally, the DAAD is also involved at an advisory level in shaping foreign cultural and education policy, international higher education policy and development policy.

The BMBF provides funding for the following programmes:

• Study abroad scholarships for Germans (students and researchers)
• Bilateral scholar exchanges and Project-Based Personnel Exchange Programmes
• German study abroad programmes (German University in Cairo, German-Jordanian University (GJU), and German-Turkish University (DTU)).
• Double degree programmes
• Bachelor Plus Programme (four-year bachelor's programme with one year of study abroad)
• IPID Programme (International Doctoral Programmes in Germany)
• PROFIN (Programme for the Integration of Foreign Students)
• Marketing for higher education in Germany ("Study in Germany" campaign and Higher Education Consortium GATE-Germany) and research marketing campaigns ("Research in Germany")
• Regional and subject-specific programmes

The following funds were available to the DAAD between 2004 and 2009 (in million €):

2004 (Actual)	2005 (Actual)	2006 (Actual)	2007 (Actual)	2008 (Actual)	2009 (Acutal)	2010 (preliminary figure)
237.50	247.80	263.30	280.60	303.90	347.90	386.68

 

Establishment:

The German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) was established in 1925, dissolved in 1945, and re-established in 1950 as a registered association under private law.

Members:

Its full members are - upon application - the institutions of higher education which are represented in the University Rectors' Conference (HRK) as well as the general student councils at these institutions.

Structure:

Organs of the DAAD are: the Members' Meeting, the Board of Trustees - consisting of appointed representatives of the Federal Government, the Länder, teachers in higher education, students, science organizations and elected representatives of the Members' Meeting - and the Executive Committee. The latter is made up of the President, Vice-President, Secretary General, nine well-known personalities with experience in work abroad, one representative each of the Federal Foreign Office, the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, the Conference of Länder Ministers of Education and Cultural Affairs, and the Donors' Association for the Promotion of Sciences and Humanities in Germany, as well as three student representatives.