Background

The Federal and State governments laid these foundations through their agreement of 6 June 2019; a new organisation was to be drawn up that would continue to support forums for innovation, exchange, networking and knowledge exchange in learning and teaching, as described in the Administrative Agreement “Innovation in Higher Education”.

Following a competitive expression of interest procedure, Toepfer Stiftung gGmbH was selected by the Joint Science Conference (GWK) on 6 December 2019 to establish this organisation under the auspices of the GWK.

The Toepfer Stiftung gGmbH is a small but experienced and well-connected player in the fields of innovative higher education and funding. With the Lehreⁿ project, it has already developed an effective alliance for quality education and has established a network of excellence for teaching-related academic development over the past ten years. Thanks to recent funding from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, a broad alliance of teaching (Lehreⁿ) has recently been made possible.

Since January 2020, all legal and organisational requirements have been met in close collaboration with the governing Federal-State Board (Bund-Länder-Gremium). The Foundation for Innovation in Higher Education (Stiftung Innovation in der Hochschullehre) was founded under the auspices of the Toepfer Stiftung gGmbH and whose mandate was to become a viable entity by 1st January 2021. An advanced funding announcement was published on 19th November 2020 to enable the first grants to be transferred to the higher education providers without delay.