Support for young researchers

Research excellence is unthinkable without excellently qualified young researchers. Following on from our very good performance in the federal and state government young researchers programme in 2017, which created 21 new tenure track positions at the UDE, we also put other important measures in place in 2018. One of them is the Graduate Center Plus (GC Plus), which was opened at the UDE with a special event to mark the occasion.

GC Plus is a professional point of contact within the Science Support Centre (SSC) that has been set up to meet the needs of young researchers – beginning from the latter stages of their Master’s up to junior professor stage. In its inaugural year alone, around 550 young researchers were able to take part in training and development opportunities offered by GC Plus. GC Plus is designed to support participants on their academic career paths but also to prepare them for alternative ones, such as leadership roles in public institutions and industry.

GC Plus is also part of the Research Academy Ruhr (RAR), which was likewise inaugurated in 2018 and is funded by the three University Alliance Ruhr (UA Ruhr) universities, MERCUR, and North Rhine-Westphalia’s state government, Land NRW. RAR is now coordinating training and development activities across the UA Ruhr to promote young researchers. This closer networking gives researchers in the UA Ruhr reciprocal access to local training opportunities and resources and encourages shared development of more specialised training and career guidance. This makes RAR one of the largest and most effective platforms for junior researchers in Germany.