The focus here is on strengthening both life sciences and simulation and data sciences. RWTH also plans to establish several professorships to advance research and the University's international visibility in these disciplines.

Three key areas of focus are intended to support and accelerate the integration of interdisciplinary research. This includes the Exploratory Research Space, ERS for short, with its well-established ERS Seed Funds, the new format of the flexible ERS Prep Funds, and the promotion of ERS projects with international partners in the International Research Space, IRS for short.

Meanwhile, each self-organized center will work on a core research program in a bottom-up process that uses state-of-the-art infrastructure and a unique research network.

Last but not least, the profile areas will be strengthened as they are the most important interdisciplinary structure. In future, the profile areas will be included in the planning of new professorships and the formation of alliances with external institutions and industry.

The Kármán Conferences that were established under Institutional Strategy II will be continued so that current research topics will keep being promoted in an interdisciplinary and internationally visible manner.

In addition, writing workshops on online collaborations, team writing, and interdisciplinary communication will be supported.

A variety of initiatives to promote internationalization are also reflected in all the other measures, emphasizing the relevance of internationally-oriented research throughout the University.

In accordance with its digitalization strategy, RWTH will use a consistent research data management system to make data generated at the University easier to find, as well as more accessible, interoperable, and reusable.

The aim is to lead the German and international scientific landscape with this effective use of resources and knowledge and to encourage greater participation in research. To this end, RWTH will continue to expand its personnel and technical infrastructure.

In future, innovative research will be conducted in so-called Living Labs and involve members of the public and other groups.

RWTH hopes that this will lead to a close cooperation between science and civil society, which will not only ensure greater transparency and more acceptance, but also offer meaningful solutions to complex problems.

One of these Living Labs will be dedicated to the topic of Responsible Research & Innovation, or RRI for short, and particularly involve students in interdisciplinary research teams together with non-profit organizations.

To acquire the brightest brains, RWTH will continue to expand its proactive, target-group-specific recruitment strategy.

The Integration Team – Human Resources, Gender and Diversity Management, IGaD for short, will also expand or redesign their sensitization and consulting offers on gender and diversity as well as their anti-bias trainings.
In future, international doctoral candidates and postdocs will have the opportunity to work on short-term research projects at RWTH thanks to travel grants made available in the newly established Advanced Research Opportunity Program, AROP for short.

In addition, the University is offering Junior Principal Investigator Fellowships, which will enable outstanding young researchers to conduct research at RWTH for a period of four to five years.

In accordance with RWTH’s internationalization strategy and objectives for the advancement of women, 70 percent of the fellowships will be allocated to international researchers and at least 30 percent to women. The fellowship will also prepare the JPIs for applying to highly competitive funding programs such as the German Research Foundation, DFG for short, and the European Research Council, ERC for short. The RWTH Center for Young Academics coordinates both standardized and individually tailored training and continuing education for young researchers.

Finally, our researchers also receive support from the Equal Opportunities Office's childcare program, which was successfully established as part of Institutional Strategy II. The Equal Opportunities Office set up an additional U3 group to provide nine childcare places for children under three, thereby easing parents’ transition back to work at RWTH.

RWTH supports interdisciplinary education for young researchers, so that students can expand their expertise beyond the boundaries of their disciplines.

In the Honors College, exceptionally talented students are identified and individually supported. With the help of their personal mentor, Master's students can determine their own curriculum to the greatest possible extent and adapt it with a view to pursuing doctoral studies at a later stage.

To promote self-determination among students, RWTH is also planning a series of digital formats for online learning as part of its digitalization strategy for teaching, so that courses, materials, and research findings can be accessed online at any time.

The University will also encourage teachers to improve their teaching by providing the Exploratory Lecturer Space from its own funds for research-oriented teaching and innovative teaching methods upon request.

To encourage entrepreneurship, this measure focuses on the development of personal entrepreneurial skills and structural support for entrepreneurial transfer.

This development will be enhanced by the newly founded RWTH Innovation GmbH, the Collective Incubator – part of the application for the Excellence Start-up Center.NRW – and the Frontier Workshops, in which representatives from business and society discuss future requirements in topics relevant to the profile areas.

The Knowledge Hub will be set up to ensure that knowledge is transferred from RWTH to the public. It acts as an essential component of the desired Open Science culture.

To further deepen the Jülich Aachen Research Alliance, JARA for short, the JARA sections will be connected even more closely to structures at RWTH and Forschungszentrum Jülich, FZJ for short, for example in the profile areas.

In addition to institutionalizing important research areas and coordinating funding procedures, RWTH and FZJ have also agreed on joint professorship appointments.

Besides cooperating with FZJ, RWTH also aims to intensify cooperations with other non-university research institutions, such as institutes from the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, the Leibniz Association, and the Max Planck Society.

Agile Governance provides the basis for a successful implementation of measures 1 to 9. It particularly stands out for responsiveness and the ability to renew, react quickly, and collaborate.

In a first step, the Dean's Council will be replaced by the Planning and Allocation Committee PAC, in which all deans and Rectorate members are represented. Supported by the Strategy Board, the main responsibility of the PAC is to ensure cross-faculty planning and structural development.

This measure has a particular focus is on the establishment of joint infrastructure platforms, interdisciplinary centers, new organizational structures, and the rapid restructuring of subject areas and University departments.

The implementation of the RWTH's strategy requires university-wide participation. The ERS funding system and the Strategy Fund provide incentives actively to contribute to the implementation and promote new ideas.