Training doctoral researchers in Research Training Groups and graduate schools
Research Training Groups and Graduate schools are designed as a network with a joint research program and provide structured qualification programs of early career researchers.
Within the Research Training Groups, doctoral researchers work for a certain period of time on common, usually interdisciplinary research topics. Doctoral researchers benefit from a special qualification program and supervision within the group. For applicants, research training groups/graduate schools are attractive because of the cooperative work on interdisciplinary research topics over a longer period of time (DFG research training groups, for example, up to 9 years). They thus also serve to establish the focal points of institutions or departments. As a rule, you can also integrate international and/or practice partners into the groups.
DFG Research Training Group and Doctoral Networks
Applications for graduate schools can be submitted to various funding agencies. You can find more details on the two most common, open-topic programs, DFG Research Training Group and Doctoral Networks, below.
The Research Training Groups funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) are institutions of higher education that can be funded for up to 9 years. In particular, they provide the qualification of early career researchers within a structured study program. A group of 5-10 university professors and advanced postdocs proposes an innovative, mostly interdisciplinary research program in which up to 30 doctoral researchers (10-15 of them DFG-funded) can participate. The basis is a structured concept for qualification and supervision.
The Doctoral Networks are a Marie Curie measure and are funded by the EU Commission within the research framework program Horizon Europe. It is a form of structured doctoral qualification in networks of several European institutions. The aim is to enhance the competence of young academics within an international, interdisciplinary, and intersectoral research and training program.
There are also formats available from other funding agencies, some of which are very specific and are not advertised permanently. Examples are the program “Humanities, Cultural Studies, Social Sciences and Professional Practice in Graduate Education” of the Volkswagen Foundation and the program “NRW Forschungskollegs” (website in German only) of the Ministry of Culture and Science of the German State of North Rhine-Westphalia. In addition, there are also various foundation-funded graduate schools, such as the Hans Böckler Foundation (website in German only).
