Institute of Educational Sciences (IfE)

The Institute of Educational Sciences (IfE) engages in a wide variety of research activities. More than any other institute, it carries out quantitative as well as qualitative studies. Based on sound methodology, it advances established methods and makes them applicable to research-based formats in the field of teacher training (Professor Anja Tervooren, Professor Nicolle Pfaff: ‘MethodenLab’; Professor Marten Clausen: ‘Portal zum fallbasierten Lehren und Lernen’, a portal for case-based approaches to teaching and learning). The Institute’s projects are aimed at discipline-specific, theoretical education and the development of educational practice. Its ongoing research can be categorised as follows:

In the cluster of basic research in the educational sciences, the Department for International Herbartianism Research (Professor Rotraut Coriand) and the Hans-Jochen Gamm Archive (Professor Armin Bernhard), which works on advancing the field of critical pedagogy, particularly stand out. Professor Nicolle Pfaff’s research into youth, anti-Muslim racism and antisemitism (2017–2024) is a representative example of the second cluster, which tackles the challenges of heterogeneity and diversity in pedagogy. Studies of the digital transformation of the education system tackle questions of school and class development, which make up the third cluster. They include three BMBF-funded projects between 2019 and 2023: ‘Metavorhaben Digi-EBF’, ‘ForUSE-digi’, and ‘DigiSchulNet’, all under Professor Isabell van Ackeren. A ProViel study on children and inclusion, ‘Kinder als Akteur*innen der Inklusion’ (under Professor Martina Richter since 2019), and an upcoming project on transnational childhoods under Professor Alexandra König, make up the cluster of childhood, youth and family in transition. With these specialisms, the IfE participates in discourses of the Interdisciplinary Centre for Educational Research (IZfB) and the Interdisciplinary Centre for Integration and Migration Research (InZentIM).

The IfE will continue to carry out systematic basic research in the educational sciences and further externally funded projects on the topics listed above in future. They include the DFG-funded project on ’subject discipline specific forms of dealing with key vocational requirements in the teaching profession’ (2021–2024, Professor Carolin Rotter) and the project ‘International Civic and Citizenship Education Study 2022’ with funding from the EU and the BMBF (2020–2024, Professor Hermann Josef Abs).