Paderborn's university concept sets new standards for women in science!

Paderborn's university concept sets new standards for women in science!

The University of Paderborn recently impressed in the second selection round of the nationwide female professor program and received the title “Equal Opportunity University”. This award underlines the university's commitment to equality between women and men and is an important step in the context of the current strategy to promote gender equality at German universities. The program runs for eight years with a total volume of 320 million euros and aims to increase the number of female professors towards parity and to provide greater support for young female scientists and researchers.

The university's equality concept focuses on three main pillars: the visibility of female scientists, gender-sensitive appointment management and gender-equitable career development. The proportion of female professors at the University of Paderborn is currently 40.5 percent. In order to further increase this number, the university relies on the support of equality actors, measures to combat discrimination and gender-equitable compatibility offers.

A strong program for equality

The female professor program was launched in 2008 and has since supported over 850 professorships. It aims to counteract the “leaky pipeline” phenomenon, which describes how women decline in the academic hierarchy despite having high levels of education. Current figures show that the proportion of women among doctoral students is 46 percent, 37 percent among postdoctoral candidates and only 28 percent among professors. This discrepancy underlines the need for targeted support programs.

As part of the 2030 program, 56 positively reviewed universities can submit applications for start-up funding by September 30, 2026 to support the initial appointment of women to permanent W2 or W3 professorships. In addition, universities with this distinction have the opportunity to submit an application for a position for a young scientist that leads to a permanent professorship.

Long-term strategies and successes

With this program, the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) has initiated a central step to promote equality in universities. The first selection round of the 2030 Professor Program has already achieved considerable success: 92 universities have successfully submitted applications. The positive evaluation of the first three program phases indicates structural improvements that are noticeable at the universities.

However, the gender gap in science remains a challenge that is being further addressed through initiatives such as promoting diversity at German universities. This also includes the funding priority “Innovative Women in Focus”, which is intended to increase the visibility of women in science and innovation. In addition, the updating process of the equality plan since 2022 has called for greater integration of gender-equitable aspects into research processes.

With its commitment and the progress it has already made, the University of Paderborn shows how important progress can be made in equality and opportunities for female scientists in the academic world. It remains to be seen what further successes the female professor program will bring in the coming years.

For further information about the goals and content of the professorship program, please visit this page BMBF as well as the report on the website University of Paderborn.

For detailed insights into the comparability and developments of gender equality in science, we recommend taking a look at the information from BMBF.