New role model for teachers in Higher Education?

Abstract

The traditional university was for decades not called into question as a place for R&D and higher education. At the one hand this enabled successful independent research, at the other hand there was few need to reflect traditional structures of knowledge transfer. The nowadays omnipresent decrease in financial resources has caused universities to compete for financial support from the business sector; additionally universities have to justify their existence for their duties in education for providing the society with academic skilled working forces. This leads to a competition between the universities and to attract applicants they have to boost the attractivity of the offered study programs. Education became a market. The traditional methods of ex-cathedra teaching have been the standard mean of knowledge transfer for a long time. The pedagogical concepts at the tertiary level were neglected; in many institutions the teaching duties were seen more as a burden than mission. The paper will show that the values of our great philosophers are still valid and how the new teaching approach of Dual Education can fulfill requirements of industry for young academics at the entrance to business life. The development of dual study programs and a new pedagogical approach in teaching methods may be one mean to face the challenges for the successful education especially in the technical sciences.