The Tenure-track Professorship

A Plannable and Transparent Career Path at KIT
Advantages of a tenure track professorship at KIT

The tenure-track professorship makes the way towards professorship much more transparent and plannable for young scientists: After a successful probationary phase, it allows for direct transition to lifelong professorship. For early-stage researchers at KIT, the tenure-track professorship is an important pillar in the career system.

Thanks to its convincing concept for supporting early-career researchers, KIT can establish fifteen new tenure-track professorships with funds from the federal / state government program to support early-career researchers. For adopting a tenure-track policy, KIT plans to establish further tenure-track professorships in the next years within the framework of the KIT Excellent Tenure project.

Attractive Working Conditions

The funding concept contains a number of measures to improve framework conditions for early-career researchers and tenure-track professorships.

  • Advanced Training
    Parallel mentoring with annual counseling interviews and a final status assessment play an important role. Via the Young Investigator Network, young researchers have access to an exclusive advanced training and further qualification program and individual coaching.
     
  • Quality Assurance
    The “Qualitätssicherungskonzept für Juniorprofessuren mit Tenure Track am KIT” (quality assurance concept for junior professorships with tenure track at KIT) ensures that the best tenure-track professors are accepted as permanent professors. Final evaluation is based on transparent criteria for W3 professorships that have been defined at the time of appointment already.
     
  • Equal Opportunities
    As the family formation phase and the qualification phase coincide in time during a tenure-track professorship, special measures are offered for the compatibility of job and family, such as an extension year in case of a birth or adoption of a child, working time regulations that are compatible with family commitments, extensive child care services, and career advice for partners. At least 40% of the tenure-track professorships are planned to be filled with women.

 

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