Ten years BAGSS: The end of an era, the beginning of a new

The idea of BAGSS was part of a broader movement towards the establishment of new, more structured doctoral training throughout the German university system. This started around the turn of the century and signalled an attempt to consider doctorates outside the classical framework of a chair. It was an attempt to incorporate lessons from university systems outside Germany and improve the chances of graduates after being awarded their doctorates. My own vision of BAGSS was one of a cosmopolitan community of researchers, where doctoral fellows were expected to conduct research at the highest level, but would receive a level of support not possible in the environment of an average chair. BAGSS fellows are considered as partners who have the opportunity to take ownership of their education and make a very active input into the activities of the School.

Innovative developments in Bamberg encouraged us to establish BAGSS in 2010 as a multidisciplinary graduate school with a clear emphasis on the empirical social and human sciences and a certain focus on questions of longitudinal educational and labour market research. The expansion of BAGSS to an international graduate school with four thematic areas and training Political Scientists, Sociologists, Psychologists, Economists, Demographers, Statisticians and Educational Researchers was only possible through the generous funding we received under the German Excellence Initiative between 2012 and 2019.

Our beginnings were modest. We received some financial support from the University to employ a coordinator. But, our possibilities were quite limited and we were in largely uncharted territory, at least in Bamberg. Our funding under the Excellence Initiative (DFG) allowed us to transform the Graduate School to an international institution for the training of doctoral fellows in the social and human sciences. Since, we had the privilege to select and support extraordinarily talented and qualified doctoral fellows. We also made several successful bids to the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) to fund some international fellows. After three or four years of funding, we had developed formats that suited our body of doctoral fellows and began to develop strategies for the longer-term sustainability of BAGSS for the time after DFG funding. We intensified the conversation with the Leibniz Institute for Educational Trajectories (LIfBi) and introduced one-year starter scholarships to give successful applicants time, resources and the support they needed to apply successfully for their own funding for the final years of their doctorate.

When the funding under the Excellence Initiative ended in 2019, we were successful in securing continued funding from the Bavarian State Government. This will allow us to continue an excellent training programme in the future.

The German economy and its university system are in a regional, national and global competition. Our affluence depends on our ability to innovate. This ability, in turn, depends on creative minds with an excellent set of intellectual tools. Well-funded institutions such as BAGSS have a chance to contribute to that. The work of the Graduate School is important because it has a potential to nurture the next generation of creative and responsible academics.

I can say Bamberg’s social sciences benefited from our increased visibility as a place for the promotion of excellent social science research at the highest levels of international excellence. This is reflected in the fact that we won the privilege to host the Winter School in Methods and Techniques of the European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR) for six years.

As a director, faculty member and supervisor, I have had the opportunity to work with a number of remarkably talented doctoral fellows many of whom have graduated with outstanding theses. The ability to recruit external candidates, including candidates from abroad made all the difference.