Even before the official opening, there is an exuberant atmosphere in the foyer of the Audimax. Numerous conversations buzz around the room, and here and there people laugh together, discuss things or even find supervision for their upcoming doctoral thesis. Initial contacts are made and experiences are exchanged. Many of the DAAD scholarship holders present are currently completing a master’s degree or doctorate at universities across Germany.
The DAAD is the German Academic Exchange Service and is the world’s largest funding organization for the international exchange of students and scientists. A central goal is to promote academic exchange by awarding scholarships for stays abroad – both for German students who want to go abroad and for foreign students who want to come to Germany.
Students as encouragers of tomorrow
Theresa Holz, head of the DAAD’s Northern Scholarship Programs department, welcomed the participants for the first time. She knows exactly what it feels like to be a participant in this event, because she was a DAAD scholarship holder herself 25 years ago.
Dr. Muriel Helbig, President of TH Lübeck and Vice President of the DAAD, welcomed the scholarship holders in their dual role. For her, it’s like the connection between her two worlds, which now come together in the campus’ auditorium. This meeting is always a special highlight of the year, because the participants make visible what international exchange can achieve: Your ideas and your academic achievements move the world forward
she said and gave the students a very northern German term: They are the encouragers for us.
Especially at a time when many countries of origin are characterized by crises, conflicts or political tensions, the meeting takes on particular importance. Scientific exchange does not automatically create easy answers. But it opens up spaces in which people can talk to one another, research, learn and meet one another.
Unexpected worlds: like a stay abroad
In addition to the special importance of this meeting, this weekend will also bring in lightness. A look at the traditional Hanseatic city of Lübeck should not be missed. Because it’s not just scientific exchange that opens up new spaces: Between the narrow houses you can see even narrower corridors, there are almost 100 of them. Feel free to go in there! They are mostly open to the public, and in some of them completely new, unexpected worlds really open up
Helbig tells the students. New unexpected worlds. Like a stay abroad.
Technology that stays and changes the world
New worlds often bring with them new insights, technologies and impulses. This is exactly the topic that Prof. Dr. Monique Janneck and prepared with her keynote Changing the World, One Bit at a Time the technical start. She asked herself how technology is changing our everyday lives and what responsibility comes with it.
And thereby made it clear that technologies do not simply disappear once they have become part of social reality. That’s why technical development is not just about what is possible, but also about what consequences new systems have for people, values and coexistence.
Good design means more than new functions. It must ask what people need, what values are important to them and what long-term effects technical systems have. Janneck referred, among other things, to user-centered and value-oriented design approaches that include aspects such as privacy, autonomy and well-being in development processes.
AI in the area of tension between benefit and loss of competence
She also classified artificial intelligence differently: AI could break down language barriers, facilitate work processes and open up new options for action. At the same time, questions arose about energy and water consumption, dependencies and skills that could be lost if people permanently hand over certain tasks to systems.
Your central idea: Technology is not only shaped by developers. It is also shaped by how people use it: We all change the world one bit at a time.
For the TH Lübeck, the meeting was a special moment on campus. As host, she was able to bring together international science, the DAAD and the city of Lübeck. Or, to stay with the image of the Lübeck corridors: it was able to open up a space in which unexpected worlds could be discovered for many participants.