Fields of action

An overview of how the framework programme is structured can be found here

Digitalisation and education

Information technologies and digital media are now indispensable to our everyday lives. For this reason, all people on their individual educational pathways should benefit from the opportunities provided by digitalisation. From the perspective of education policy, this means providing funding for research projects that contribute to this aim and answer key questions: How can we use digital media meaningfully in teaching and learning processes? What competencies and skills are necessary for this? Using sound educational concepts, it is possible to deliver digitally supported education at all ages and to beneficially integrate new technologies into existing learning environments.

Educational equity and individual potentials

Providing everyone with equal opportunity to the best education is the goal and the yardstick of education policy in Germany. International benchmarking studies such as PISA and PIRLS/IGLU clearly show that inequality in education is a long-term challenge. One in five 15-year-olds in Germany, for example, is barely able to understand texts correctly or apply basic everyday arithmetic – young people from socially disadvantaged families are particularly affected. According to initial studies, the coronavirus pandemic could further exacerbate these socially determined disadvantages. Creating more educational equity is therefore a vital political and social task. Research in the framework programme contributes to a better understanding of the conditions required for equal opportunity and to the development of appropriate measures and instruments to overcome existing barriers. Educational opportunities must be more accessible, and the potential of each and every individual must be fostered across all stages of education.

Diversity and social cohesion

Individual learning needs, inclusion, and cultural and linguistic diversity are leading to increasing heterogeneity in educational institutions. Yet how can we successfully design educational practice under these conditions? To answer this question, the framework programme supports research on how to deal with cultural and individual diversity in instructional design, in concrete teaching and learning situations, and in learning groups. Moreover, it also deals with the question of how social cohesion can be strengthened moving forward under the conditions of diversity and the growing trend towards polarisation in society. After all, only together we can build a society that is resilient to the future.

Quality in education

High-quality education is the key to combating educational inequality, to achieving sustainable economic success in globalised competition, and to social development. Therefore, a key line of research enquiry in the framework programme concerns how we can succeed in further improving the quality of education in a targeted manner and ensuring this is sustained in the long term. The aim is to improve the framework conditions under which educational institutions operate – the conditions for organisational and personnel development, as well as for the design of educational processes – so that learning becomes a success for each and every individual.