At a press conference in Berlin on 4 June, Germany’s ACA member DAAD presented its annual report for the year 2018, showcasing the organisations work and achievements in that year. DAAD’s 2018 record is indeed impressive. DAAD President, Margret Wintermantel, and DAAD Secretary General, Dorothea Rüland, reported that the organisation had awarded mobility scholarships to over 145 000 students and academic staff. This is a 4% increase on 2017 numbers. 81 300 of the 145 000 scholarship holders were outgoings, while 63 700 were inbound mobile. The favourite destinations of outbound mobile Germans remained Western Europe, North America and Asia.  

DAAD also announced new programmes. One of those, International mobility and cooperation go digital, provides funding for digitalisation. Another one funds the internationalisation of teacher education in Germany. There is also a new programme supporting international activities of Germany’s universities of applied science (Fachhochschulen), the oldest of which are celebrating their 50th anniversary this year. DAAD has also just launched the initiative A new passage to India, a cooperation project of the Leibniz University Hannover (LUH) and the Indian Institute of Technology Indore (IITI).

Announcing a number of events and initiatives in support of academic freedom and science diplomacy, the press conference highlighted another anniversary, of Germany’s constitution (Grundgesetz), which turns 70 this year. Article 5 of the constitution guarantees the freedom of science.

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