Choosing to Study Engineering

Inclination towards the subject and the possibility to influence this

Runtime

01/2008 - 6/2009

Contracting Authority

Financing provided by the Saxon State Ministry for Science and Art

Goals / Summary

The availability of highly qualified engineers is often considered a given, or at least as a significant prerequisite for the future sustainability of a highly technological society such as Germany. This expectation is especially noticed by those in politics or business when a lack of new recruits on the job market is looming. The variety of discussions about intensifying recruitment of foreign professionals for the local economy, such as the implementation of the “bluecard” for foreign engineers or the “greencard” for foreign IT specialists, points towards a clearly visible lack of technical and scientific recruits. The need for highly qualified professionals and the demand for places at a university to study engineering seem to be wildly divergent. Especially in strictly technical subjects, fears have accumulated in the meantime that in the coming years the young engineers leaving university will not even be sufficient to fill the positions left empty by those going into retirement. Although a lack of engineers exists, or at least is feared, the present capacities in engineering sciences at universities are not being fully utilized. These circumstances point towards the problem of too few young engineers lying primarily in the demand to study it rather than insufficient capacity for students at universities; hence this problem is connected to the appeal of the subject.

There already exists a plethora of research, programs and pilot projects put into practice on the topic of studying engineering. The existing programs and pilot projects have the main goal of stimulating interest in studying technical subjects in young women and of tackling their mental or motivational hesitancy towards these fields.

The goal of this study was to trace the development of demand for studying engineering and to collect and organize information about the state of research regarding the reasons for and roots of the problem of stagnating demand in engineering sciences, as well as the possibility to counteract this and heighten the appeal of studying engineering. A comprehensive evaluation of official university statistics and of available empirical studies rather than our own surveys were used for this purpose. Not only was the whole of Germany in the spotlight, but the state of Saxony in particular.

Project Management

Prof. Dr. Karl Lenz
Prof. Dr. Andrä Wolter

Contributor

Dipl.-Soz. Antje Jahn