Portrait of the University of Erfurt

Ein Student und eine Studentin stehen vor dem Haupteingang der Universität Erfurt

Since its refoundation in 1994, the University of Erfurt has firmly established itself in the national and international university landscape with an explicit cultural and social science profile. With its focus on religion, the humanities and cultural studies, society and teacher training, it is a centrally located education and research institution with around 6,000 students, around 100 professorships and around 400 academic staff and 300 administrative staff.

Certified as "family-friendly", the University of Erfurt, as a reform university with its attractive and sometimes unusual teaching and research profile, has from the outset focused on Bachelor and Master courses and interdisciplinarity. It addresses the major social challenges of our time and is committed to international scientific cooperation with a view to global participation in knowledge and science.

On its campus in the state capital, close to the city centre, the University of Erfurt enables direct communication through its short distances and promotes intensive study and interdisciplinary research. And with its mentoring system, the "Studium Fundamentale" and an orientation on professional fields, it is also a model for other universities. It also has two professional schools based on the American model: the Willy Brandt School of Public Policy and the Erfurt School of Education, which is responsible for coordinating the nationwide exemplary teacher training.

Unique profile

Studentin leitet Kinder an
Zeichnung zweier Köpfe im virtuellen Raum
Personen schauen auf Karten in der Forschungsbibliothek Gotha

Today, the University of Erfurt sets standards in basic research and at the same time strives to transfer its scientific findings to society. In doing so, the four faculties – Faculty of Philosophy, Faculty of Education, Faculty of Economics, Law and Social Sciences and Faculty of Catholic Theology –, the Max Weber Centre for Advanced Cultural and Social Studies and the Gotha Research Institutes contribute their structural and task-related diversity to the overall concept, thus enabling interdisciplinary, international and cooperative research.

Against this background, the University of Erfurt also attaches particular importance to academic freedom and the promotion of young researchers.
The attractive and in part unusual profile of the University of Erfurt is also reflected in its research activities within the three main areas of focus "Education, School, and Behaviour", "Religion, Society, and World Relations." and "Knowledge, Spaces, and Media.".

In the sense of an "Erfurter Modell", the university will continue to underline its role as an unusual profile university in the future, thus enhancing its attractiveness and special recognizability. In addition to its accentuation as an innovative reform university, it will also expand its original idea of internationality in the direction of interculturality and diversity of cultures as a "mission statement" for the entire Erfurt Model. That is also what we stand for:

People as they are, with different social backgrounds and educational biographies, in different life situations, with chronic illnesses and disabilities or healthy, with family responsibilities, with diverse gender and sexual identities, different skin colours, different migration histories, different nationalities and ethnic affiliations, religions, world views and a multitude of other differentiating characteristics – they should all feel welcome at the University of Erfurt and see it as a place that they can help to develop and many other different characteristics." (excerpt from our diversity strategy)

Facts and figures

number of students: 5834 (status winter semester 2023/24, without students on leave of absence)
number of international students (including guest auditors): 551 (status 2023)
number of doctoral students: 590 (status 01.12.2023)
number of employees: 782 (status 2023)
number of professors: 103 (status 2023)
number of study programmes: 47 (status 2023)
population of the city of Erfurt: 216.065 (status March 2024)

download: organization charts (in German only)

Supporters

Universitätsgesellschaft

The Universitätsgesellschaft Erfurt sees itself as a link between Erfurt and the university. Its aim is not only to contribute to networking between the two, but also to offer the University support in current affairs in addition to preserving tradition.
Website of Universitätsgesellschaft Erfurt

Friends of the Gotha Research Library

The Friends of the Gotha Research Library e. V., founded in 2006, brings together people who are connected to the Gotha Research Library in different ways. Casual users and scholars come together here, city guides looking for inspiration for their guided tours, guests stopping off in the former royal seat of Gotha, students looking for topics for their seminar work - people who are curious, who are fascinated by old books and who enjoy exchanging ideas with each other. The Circle of Friends organises lectures, invites people on special tours and supports the research library in restoration and other tasks.

website Friends of the Gotha Research Library

Sponsors for professorships

Further generous subsidies

Sparkassen- und Giroverband Hessen-Thüringen, Erfurt
Ernst-Abbe-Stiftung, Jena (Herzog Ernst Scholarships, Gotha)
Sparkassen-Stiftung Erfurt (Max Weber Prize for young researchers)
Evangelischen Schulstiftung in Mitteldeutschland (Deutschland-Stipendium // national scholarship)
Thüringer Aufbaubank(Deutschland-Stipendium // national scholarship)
Vereinigte Kirchen- und Klosterkammer Erfurt (Deutschland-Stipendium // national scholarship)
Zonta-Club Erfurt (Deutschland-Stipendium // national scholarship)

as well as other institutions and persons, some of whom wish to remain unnamed.

An overview of research projects funded by third parties (e.g. DFG, BMBF, Mercator Foundation, Volkswagen Foundation) can be found on our research websites.

Quicklinks

Eine Studentin steht in einem Hörsaal der Universität Erfurt
Studium
Study programmes Overview
Studierende in der Universitätsbibliothek, Universität Erfurt
Service
Faculties, Institutes & Services Overview