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Das sogenannte „Deutschlandstipendium“ ist 2010 ins Leben gerufen worden. Gemäß den gesetzlichen Vorgaben sollen die Stipendien nach Begabung und Leistung vergeben werden. Darüber hinaus sollen auch gesellschaftliches Engagement oder besondere soziale, familiäre oder persönliche Umstände berücksichtigt werden. Bei der Finanzierung sind die Hochschulen zunächst auf das Einwerben privater Fördermittel angewiesen, die von Bund und Land um denselben Betrag aufgestockt werden. Die privaten Mittelgeber können für die von ihnen anteilig finanzierten Stipendien festlegen, aus welchen Studiengängen ihre Stipendiaten ausgewählt werden sollen. Die Hochschulen haben jedoch darauf zu achten, dass ein Drittel aller zu vergebenden Stipendien ohne eine entsprechende Zweckbindung vergeben werden. Einen direkten Einfluss auf die Auswahl einzelner Kandidaten dürfen die Förderer nicht haben. Vor diesem Hintergrund sind die Hochschulen angehalten, Anreize für private Förderer zu schaffen und parallel Bewerbungs- und Auswahlverfahren zu konzipieren, die die genannten gesetzlichen Vorgaben einhalten. Dadurch entsteht bei den Hochschulen ein erheblicher Verwaltungsaufwand. Zu dessen Reduzierung wird in diesem Artikel ein transparenter, nachvollziehbarer, zeit- und kostensparender Prozess durch einen programmierten Workflow beschrieben.
Nitrile-type inhibitors are known to interact with cysteine proteases in a covalent-reversible manner. The chemotype of 3-cyano-3-aza-β-amino acid derivatives was designed in which the N-cyano group is centrally arranged in the molecule to allow for interactions with the nonprimed and primed binding regions of the target enzymes. These compounds were evaluated as inhibitors of the human cysteine cathepsins K, S, B, and L. They exhibited slow-binding behavior and were found to be exceptionally potent, in particular toward cathepsin K, with second-order rate constants up to 52 900 × 103 M–1 s–1.
Updating a shared data structure in a parallel program is usually done with some sort of high-level synchronization operation to ensure correctness and consistency. The realization of such high-level synchronization operations is done with appropriate low-level atomic synchronization instructions that the target processor architecture provides. These instructions are costly and often limited in their scalability on larger multi-core / multi-processor systems. In this paper, a technique is discussed that replaces atomic updates of a shared data structure with ordinary and cheaper read/write operations. The necessary conditions are specified that must be fulfilled to ensure overall correctness of the program despite missing synchronization. The advantage of this technique is the reduction of access costs as well as more scalability due to elided atomic operations. But on the other side, possibly more work has to be done caused by missing synchronization. Therefore, additional work is traded against costly atomic operations. A practical application is shown with level-synchronous parallel Breadth-First Search on an undirected graph where two vertex frontiers are accessed in parallel. This application scenario is also used for an evaluation of the technique. Tests were done on four different large parallel systems with up to 64-way parallelism. It will be shown that for the graph application examined the amount of additional work caused by missing synchronization is neglectible and the performance is almost always better than the approach with atomic operations.
Abstract Classical ballet requires dancers to exercise significant muscle control and strength both while stationary and when moving. Following the Royal Academy of Dance (RAD) syllabus, 8 male and 27 female dancers (aged 20.2 + 1.9 yr) in a full-time university undergraduate dance training program were asked to stand in first position for 10 seconds and then perform 10 repeats of a demi-plié exercise to a counted rhythm. Accelerometer records from the wrist, sacrum, knee and ankle were compared with the numerical scores from a professional dance instructor. The sacrum mounted sensor detected lateral tilts of the torso in dances with lower scores (Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient r = -0.64, p < 0.005). The 5RMS6 acceleration amplitude of wrist mounted sensor was linearly correlated to the movement scores (Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient r = 0.63, p < 0.005). The application of sacrum and wrist mounted sensors for biofeedback during dance training is a realistic, low cost option.
Low power dissipation is a current topic in digital design, and therefore, it should be covered in a state-of-the-art electrical engineering curriculum. This paper describes how low-power design can be addressed within a digital design course. Doing so would be beneficial for both topics because low-power design is not detached from the systems perspective, and the digital design course would be enriched by references to current challenges and applications. Thus, the presented course should serve as an example of how a course can be developed to also teach students about sustainable engineering.
Seit vielen Jahren ist der Übergang von der Schule zur Hochschule eines der zentralen Themen für didaktische Theorien, empirische Untersuchungen und bildungspolitische Diskussionen. Ein dabei identifiziertes großes Problem vieler Studierender ist, dass mit dem Abitur „eine Lebensphase mit meist klar definierten Zielen in überschaubaren räumlichen, familiären und schulischen Strukturen endet“.1) Entscheidet man sich als Studierender gegen die nicht akademische Laufbahn und nimmt ein Hochschulstudium auf, trifft man auf Studienstrukturen und -bedingungen, die einem fremd und chaotisch vorkommen können. Der Weg an die Hochschulen ermöglicht den Individuen eine Reihe von Optionen, ist aber leider auch immer mit Risiken und Unsicherheiten behaftet. Entscheidungen müssen nun selbstständig vorbereitet und getroffen werden und dies in einem Umfeld, das sehr unterschiedlich im Vergleich zur bekannten Schulstruktur sein kann.
The analytical pyrolysis technique hyphenated to gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS) has extended the range of possible tools for the characterization of synthetic polymers and copolymers. Pyrolysis involves thermal fragmentation of the analytical sample at temperatures of 500–1400 °C. In the presence of an inert gas, reproducible decomposition products characteristic for the original polymer or copolymer sample are formed. The pyrolysis products are chromatographically separated using a fused-silica capillary column and are subsequently identified by interpretation of the obtained mass spectra or by using mass spectra libraries. The analytical technique eliminates the need for pretreatment by performing analyses directly on the solid or liquid polymer sample. In this article, application examples of analytical pyrolysis hyphenated to GC–MS for the identification of different polymeric materials in the plastic and automotive industry, dentistry, and occupational safety are demonstrated. For the first time, results of identification of commercial light-curing dental filling material and a car wrapping foil by pyrolysis–GC–MS are presented.
Analytical pyrolysis technique hyphenated to gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (Py-GC/MS) has extended the range of possible tools for characterization of synthetic polymers/copolymers. Pyrolysis involves thermal fragmentation of the analytical sample at elevated temperature between 500 and 1400 °C. In the presence of an inert gas, reproducible decomposition products characteristic for the original polymer/copolymer sample are formed. The pyrolysis products are chromatographically separated by using a fused silica capillary column and subsequently identified by interpretation of the obtained mass spectra or by using mass spectra libraries. The analytical technique eliminate the need for pre-treatment by performing analyses directly on the solid or liquid polymer sample.
In this paper, application examples of the analytical pyrolysis hyphenated to gas chromatography/mass spectrometry for the identification of different polymeric materials in the plastic and automotive industry, dentistry and occupational safety are demonstrated. For the first time results of identification of commercially light-curing dental filling material and a car wrapping foil by pyrolysis-GC/MS are presented.
The analytical pyrolysis technique hyphenated to gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS) has extended the range of possible tools for the characterization of synthetic polymers and copolymers. Pyrolysis involves thermal fragmentation of the analytical sample at temperatures of 500–1400 °C. In the presence of an inert gas, reproducible decomposition products characteristic for the original polymer or copolymer sample are formed. The pyrolysis products are chromatographically separated using a fused-silica capillary column and are subsequently identified by interpretation of the obtained mass spectra or by using mass spectra libraries. The analytical technique eliminates the need for pretreatment by performing analyses directly on the solid or liquid polymer sample. In this article, application examples of analytical pyrolysis hyphenated to GC–MS for the identification of different polymeric materials in the plastic and automotive industry, dentistry, and occupational safety are demonstrated. For the first time, results of identification of commercial light-curing dental filling material and a car wrapping foil by pyrolysis–GC–MS are presented.
Automated parameterization of intermolecular pair potentials using global optimization techniques
(2014)
In this work, different global optimization techniques are assessed for the automated development of molecular force fields, as used in molecular dynamics and Monte Carlo simulations. The quest of finding suitable force field parameters is treated as a mathematical minimization problem. Intricate problem characteristics such as extremely costly and even abortive simulations, noisy simulation results, and especially multiple local minima naturally lead to the use of sophisticated global optimization algorithms. Five diverse algorithms (pure random search, recursive random search, CMA-ES, differential evolution, and taboo search) are compared to our own tailor-made solution named CoSMoS. CoSMoS is an automated workflow. It models the parameters’ influence on the simulation observables to detect a globally optimal set of parameters. It is shown how and why this approach is superior to other algorithms. Applied to suitable test functions and simulations for phosgene, CoSMoS effectively reduces the number of required simulations and real time for the optimization task.
Hybrid system models exploit the modelling abstraction that fast state transitions take place instantaneously so that they encompass discrete events and the continuous time behaviour for the while of a system mode. If a system is in a certain mode, e.g. two rigid bodies stick together, then residuals of analytical redundancy relations (ARRs) within certain small bounds indicate that the system is healthy. An unobserved mode change, however, invalidates the current model for the dynamic behaviour. As a result, ARR residuals may exceed current thresholds indicating faults in system components that have not happened. The paper shows that ARR residuals derived from a bond graph cannot only serve as fault indicators but may also be used for bond graph model-based system mode identification. ARR residuals are numerically computed in an off-line simulation by coupling a bond graph of the faulty system to a non-faulty system bond graph through residual sinks. In real-time simulation, the faulty system model is to be replaced by measurements from the real system. As parameter values are uncertain, it is important to determine adaptive ARR thresholds that, given uncertain parameters, allow to decide whether the dynamic behaviour in a current system mode is the one of the healthy system so that false alarms or overlooking of true faults can be avoided. The paper shows how incremental bond graphs can be used to determine adaptive mode-dependent ARR thresholds for switched linear time-invariant systems with uncertain parameters in order to support robust fault detection. Bond graph-based hybrid system mode identification as well as the determination of adaptive fault thresholds is illustrated by application to a power electronic system easy to survey. Some simulation results have been analytically validated.
Purpose – The aim of the study is to investigate the implementation of corporate sustainability (CS) in the German real estate sector.
Design/methodology/approach – The authors begin by outlining the framework set by the European Union and the German Federal Government for companies wanting to be classified as sustainable. After this, the relevance of sustainability for German real estate companies is discussed. Their empirical section contains an international comparison. Finally, they present an analysis checking the implementation of CS for the main 135 German real estate companies.
Findings – The present analysis shows that German real estate companies compare well with their international counterparts, in 2012 representing 15 per cent of all real estate firms reporting on the basis of the Global Reporting Initiative. However, of the 135 companies in Germany surveyed, only a small proportion classify themselves as CS and CSR (corporate social responsibility) enterprises. This number could be rapidly increased by better documentation of companies’ commitment to sustainability.
Practical implications – The study’s importance lies in the overview it provides of CS activities in the German real estate industry. In addition, it provides hints on how companies can improve their documentation to classify as CSR enterprises. Although the analysis concentrates on Germany, the results are also relevant for companies in other European countries.
Das AD 2000-Regelwerk ist der dominierende Standard für den Druckbehälterbau in Deutschland. Die bereits in anderen europäischen Ländern verbreitete DIN EN 13445 findet kaum Berücksichtigung. Dies allerdings zu Unrecht, denn ein aktueller Vergleich, der im Rahmen einer Bachelorarbeit durchgeführte wurde, zeigt: Die EN 13445 ist zu einer echten Alternative gereift. Gerade das Hauptargument gegen eine Umstellung, die steigenden Kosten, ist längst überholt.
Dysregulation of IL12 Signaling As a Novel Cause of an Autoimmune Lymphoproliferative like Syndrome
(2014)
An Universitäten und Fachhochschulen ist die Mathematik-Ausbildung eines der Nadelöhre für angehende Ingenieurinnen und Ingenieure. Viele Studierende der Ingenieurwissenschaften scheitern in den ersten Studiensemestern an den Anforderungen der Mathematik. Lehrende, Fach- und Hochschuldidaktiker/innen und zunehmend auch Fachvertretungen und Verbände stellen sich die Frage, was an den Fakultäten und Fachbereichen getan werden kann, damit Studierende ihre mathematischen Fähigkeiten vergrößern und den anspruchsvollen Studienweg zur Ingenieurin oder zum Ingenieur meistern können.
Breadth-First Search is a graph traversal technique used in many applications as a building block, e.g., to systematically explore a search space or to determine single source shortest paths in unweighted graphs. For modern multicore processors and as application graphs get larger, well-performing parallel algorithms are favorable. In this paper, we systematically evaluate an important class of parallel algorithms for this problem and discuss programming optimization techniques for their implementation on parallel systems with shared memory. We concentrate our discussion on level-synchronous algorithms for larger multicore and multiprocessor systems. In our results, we show that for small core counts many of these algorithms show rather similar performance behavior. But, for large core counts and large graphs, there are considerable differences in performance and scalability influenced by several factors, including graph topology. This paper gives advice, which algorithm should be used under which circumstances.
People are getting older because of the demographic changes and the rate of disabled people is also going up. This article shows the challenge for BPMTool developer due to these circumstances. It illustrates how these changes impact the usage of BPM-Tools based on an Evaluation of an exemplary BPMTool (Cooper & Patterson, 2007) in terms of IT-Usability and IT-Accessibility. This evaluation was conducted in a research laboratory at the university.
We are happy to present you the special issue on Best Practice in Robot Software Development of the Journal on Software Engineering for Robotics! The spark for this special issue came during the eighth workshop on Software Development and Integration in Robotics (SDIR) at the 2013 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation. The workshop focused on Robot Software Architectures, and the fruitful discussions made it clear that the design, development, and deployment of robot software is always an interplay between competing aspects. These are often couched in antagonistic pairs, such as dependability versus performance, and prominently include quality attributes as well as functional, nonfunctional, and application requirements.
GRI4-Guidelines
(2014)
In diesem Beitrag wird gezeigt, dass das Corporate Social Responsibility-Controlling (CSR-Controlling) im Zuge der neuen Berichterstattungsvorgaben der Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) vor neuen Herausforderungen steht. Die neue GRI-4-Version fordert über erweiterte und neue Pflichtstandardangaben die CSR-Umsetzung in höchster Niveauausprägung ein und setzt neue Maßstäbe an die CSR-Gütekriterien „Transparenz“ und „Rechenschaftslegung“ in der gesamten Supply Chain. In der Analyse werden die für den zukünftigen GRI-4-Berichtseinstieg erforderlichen Anpassungsschritte dargestellt und in einem GRI-3.1-versus-GRI-4-Vergleich indikatorenbezogen erläutert.
Might the gravity levels found on other planets and on the moon be sufficient to provide an adequate perception of upright for astronauts? Can the amount of gravity required be predicted from the physiological threshold for linear acceleration? The perception of upright is determined not only by gravity but also visual information when available and assumptions about the orientation of the body. Here, we used a human centrifuge to simulate gravity levels from zero to earth gravity along the long-axis of the body and measured observers' perception of upright using the Oriented Character Recognition Test (OCHART) with and without visual cues arranged to indicate a direction of gravity that differed from the body's long axis. This procedure allowed us to assess the relative contribution of the added gravity in determining the perceptual upright. Control experiments off the centrifuge allowed us to measure the relative contributions of normal gravity, vision, and body orientation for each participant. We found that the influence of 1 g in determining the perceptual upright did not depend on whether the acceleration was created by lying on the centrifuge or by normal gravity. The 50% threshold for centrifuge-simulated gravity's ability to influence the perceptual upright was at around 0.15 g, close to the level of moon gravity but much higher than the threshold for detecting linear acceleration along the long axis of the body. This observation may partially explain the instability of moonwalkers but is good news for future missions to Mars.
The contribution of the most common reciprocal translocation in childhood B-cell precursor leukemia t(12;21)(p13;q22) to leukemia development is still under debate. Direct as well as secondary indirect effects of the TEL-AML1 fusion protein are commonly recorded by using cell lines and patient samples, often bearing the TEL-AML1 fusion protein for decades. To identify direct targets of the fusion protein a short-term induction of TEL-AML1 is needed. We here describe in detail the experimental procedure, quality controls and contents of the ChIP, mRNA expression and SILAC datasets associated with the study published by Linka and colleagues in the Blood Cancer Journal [1] utilizing a short term induction of TEL-AML1 in an inducible precursor B-cell line model.
Matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) are matrix-degrading enzymes that are over-expressed in joints of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients. However, the contribution of specific MMPs for the development of arthritic joints is unknown. This study is aimed at studying the role of matrix metalloproteinase-9 (MMP-9) in mice, using the K/BxN serum-transfer model of RA. Arthritis was induced in Balb/c mice by injecting K/BxN serum. Development of arthritis was followed in these mice by measuring ankle thickness and clinical index score. MMP-9 expression in the joints of mice killed at various time points during the disease progression was determined by gelatin zymography using ankle lysates. We found that MMP-9 expression increased with the severity of arthritis. Importantly MMP-9 deficient mice injected with K/BxN serum showed a milder form of arthritis in comparison to the control C57BL/6 mice injected with K/BxN serum. We therefore conclude that MMP-9 promotes arthritis in mice.
Die nachhaltige Organisation des Verkehrs soll auf kostengünstige, umweltfreundliche und nutzerfreundlichere Nahverkehrskonzepte, die möglichst viele Bürger zur Nutzung des ÖPNV einladen, abzielen. Vor diesem Hintergrund ist es das Ziel dieses Beitrags, instrumentelle Ansatzpunkte für ein Nachhaltigkeitscontrolling in ÖPNV-Unternehmen aufzuzeigen. Hierzu werden nachfolgend die Berücksichtigung der Nachhaltigkeit bei Investitionsentscheidungen, das Carbon Accounting (Transparenz über CO2-Emissionen), die Integration der ökologischen, ökonomischen und sozialen Nachhaltigkeitsdimension bei der Berichterstattung und die Einbindung der genannten Instrumente in ein Managementsystem skizziert. Die Nachhaltigkeitsdimensionen Ökologie, Ökonomie und Soziales lassen sich gut mit Hilfe mehrdimensionaler, integrierter Managementsysteme in der Organisation verankern und systematisch in interne Strukturen und Prozesse einbetten. Integrierte Managementsysteme können so eine wichtige Voraussetzung für ein effizientes Nachhaltigkeitscontrolling sein.
It has become increasingly clear that caspases, far from being merely cell death effectors, have a much wider range of functions within the cell. These functions are as diverse as signal transduction and cytoskeletal remodeling, and caspases are now known to have an essential role in cell proliferation, migration, and differentiation. There is also evidence that apoptotic cells themselves can direct the behavior of nearby cells through the caspase-dependent secretion of paracrine signaling factors. In some processes, including the differentiation of skeletal muscle myoblasts, both caspase activation in differentiating cells as well as signaling from apoptotic cells has been reported. Here, we review the non-apoptotic outcomes of caspase activity in a range of different model systems and attempt to integrate this knowledge.
We consider the Hopfield model with n neurons and an increasing number p=p(n) of randomly chosen patterns and use Stein's method to obtain rates of convergence for the central limit theorem of overlap parameters, which holds for every fixed choice of the overlap parameter for almost all realisations of the random patterns.
Current computer architectures are multi-threaded and make use of multiple CPU cores. Most garbage collections policies for the Java Virtual Machine include a stop-the-world phase, which means that all threads are suspended. A considerable portion of the execution time of Java programs is spent in these stop-the-world garbage collections. To improve this behavior, a thread-local allocation and garbage collection that only affects single threads, has been proposed. Unfortunately, only objects that are not accessible by other threads ("do not escape") are eligible for this kind of allocation. It is therefore necessary to reliably predict the escaping of objects. The work presented in this paper analyzes the escaping of objects based on the line of code (program counter – PC) the object was allocated at. The results show that on average 60-80% of the objects do not escape and can therefore be locally allocated.
Rehabilitation wirkt
(2014)
Die medizinische Rehabilitation bildet im bundesdeutschen Gesundheitssystem eine wichtige Säule. Sie wird weltweit immer wieder als vorbildlich angesehen und ist im internationalen Vergleich mit Mitteln, Infrastruktur, Know-how und Behandlungsqualität hervorragend ausgestattet. Dies ist gut so, aber ist es gut genug?
Die Norm EN ISO 13849-1 stellt explizite Anforderungen an sicherheitsgerichtete SPS-Software. Wie lassen sich diese im Maschinenbau praxisgerecht umsetzen? Mit dieser Frage hat sich ein von der DGUV gefördertes und an der Hochschule Bonn-Rhein-Sieg durchgeführtes Projekt beschäftigt. Der Beitrag skizziert die Vorgehensweise zur möglichen Umsetzung der normativen Anforderungen. Diese Vorgehensweise ist unabhängig von der verwendeten Sicherheits-SPS und daher allgemein anwendbar. Es wird auf insgesamt 10 dokumentierte Beispiele und einen ausführlichen Forschungsbericht verwiesen, die downloadbar sind.
Social cash transfers (SCTs) are considered a priority in least-developed countries, where the gap between the need for basic social protection and existing provisions is greatest. This study represents one of the first comprehensive treatments of the impact of social cash transfers in low-income sub-Saharan Africa, and the first for Zambia's oldest SCT scheme. The results, based on propensity score matching and fully efficient odds-weighted regression, and data from the Kalomo SCT pilot scheme, confirm positive SCT effects on per capita consumption expenditure. We also discover threshold effects with SCT mostly impacting food expenditure among poorer beneficiary households and non-food expenditure among wealthier beneficiaries.
We investigated graphene structures grafted with fullerenes. The size of the graphene sheets ranges from 6400 to 640,000 atoms. The fullerenes (C60 and C240) are placed on top of the graphene sheets, using different impact velocities we could distinguish three types of impact. Furthermore, we investigated the changes of the vibrational properties. The modified graphene planes show additional features in the vibronic density of states.
This review is divided into two interconnected parts, namely a biological and a chemical one. The focus of the first part is on the biological background for constructing tissue-engineered vascular grafts to promote vascular healing. Various cell types, such as embryonic, mesenchymal and induced pluripotent stem cells, progenitor cells and endothelial- and smooth muscle cells will be discussed with respect to their specific markers. The in vitro and in vivo models and their potential to treat vascular diseases are also introduced. The chemical part focuses on strategies using either artificial or natural polymers for scaffold fabrication, including decellularized cardiovascular tissue. An overview will be given on scaffold fabrication including conventional methods and nanotechnologies. Special attention is given to 3D network formation via different chemical and physical cross-linking methods. In particular, electron beam treatment is introduced as a method to combine 3D network formation and surface modification. The review includes recently published scientific data and patents which have been registered within the last decade.
Structure-activity relationships of thiostrepton derivatives: implications for rational drug design
(2014)
The case for basic human needs in coaching: A neuroscientific perspective - The SCOAP Coach Theory
(2014)
It is a euphemism to say that humans use tools. Humans possess a vast repertoire of tools they use every day. In fact, as language or bipedal locomotion, tool use is a hallmark of humans. Tool use has also been often viewed as an important step during evolution (van Schaik et al., 1999) or even as a marker of the evolution of human intelligence (Wynn, 1985). So a fundamental issue is, what are the cognitive and neural bases of human tool use? The present series of papers in this special topic represents the newest additions to that research topic.
Exposure to microgravity conditions causes cardiovascular deconditioning in astronauts during spaceflight. Until now, no specific drugs are available for countermeasure, since the underlying mechanism is largely unknown. Endothelial cells (ECs) and smooth muscle cells (SMCs) play key roles in various vascular functions, many of which are regulated by purinergic 2 (P2) receptors. However, their function in ECs and SMCs under microgravity conditions is still unclear. In this study, primary ECs and SMCs were isolated from bovine aorta and verified with specific markers. We show for the first time that the P2 receptor expression pattern is altered in ECs and SMCs after 24 h exposure to simulated microgravity using a clinostat. However, conditioned medium compensates this change in specific P2 receptors, for example, P2X7. Notably, P2 receptors such as P2X7 might be the important players during the paracrine interaction. Additionally, ECs and SMCs secreted different cytokines under simulated microgravity, leading into a pathogenic proliferation and migration. In conclusion, our data indicate P2 receptors might be important players responding to gravity changes in ECs and SMCs. Since some artificial P2 receptor ligands are applied as drugs, it is reasonable to assume that they might be promising candidates against cardiovascular deconditioning in the future.
The Project SupraMetall: Towards Commercial Fabrication of High-Temperature Superconducting Tapes
(2014)
Improving the study entry supports students in a decisive phase of their university education. Implementing improvements is a change process and can only be successful if the relevant stakeholders are addressed and convinced. In the described Teaching Quality Pact project evaluation data is used as a mean to discuss in the university the situation of the study programs. As these discussions were based on empirical data rather than on opinion, it was possible to achieve an open discussion about measures that are implemented. The open discussion is maintained during the project when results of the measures taken are analyzed.