Welcome to the fourth ESNA podcast on higher education and science policy.

Today we are taking another look at internationalization, this time asking how German universities attract talk scientists.

We will be talking to Professor Hans DeBitt from Boston College in the United States,

where he is director of the

Center for International Higher Education. Thank you for joining us, Professor DeWitt.

You are a renowned author on the topic of internationalization. Does Germany have a new role

in the competition for top scientists? Yeah, I think so. And of course, not only Germany,

B or see other countries moving in the same direction. France is another example of that, the UK.

The excellence program in Germany is a way how Germany tries to move up in the tops of high

education institutions at world-class universities.

And since world-class universities are for a strong way defined by not only their funding,

but also by having top scientists and top students internationally,

they have to invest in bringing international scientists and returning

German scientists who are in the United States and elsewhere and selecting the best and

brightest students to come.

Do you think that there has been a price raise in this sector in the last few years?

Yes, a little bit, but not so much in the salaries. I think it's much more in the facilities, the service that the professors get.

So, do they get enough support staff, so associate professors, assistant professors, graduate assistants,

do they get good laboratories and other facilities

to be able to compete? That seems to be much more important for faculty than the high salaries

they get. Germany seems to following the American approach of bringing in lots of their

leading scientists from abroad instead of training them themselves.

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