Mission Statement for Teaching and Learning

The mission statement makes clear what we stand for and what is important to us. We connect to the values of HKA and make them more specific for the area of teaching and learning. We, that is the teachers, the students and all employees who directly or indirectly contribute to the success of our students. In addition to competencies and content, we focus on people and the relationships between people and successful cooperation.

The draft of the mission statement was developed by a Senate commission in spring 2021 and put up for discussion throughout the university in a digital participation format. Suggestions from the discussion were incorporated into the mission statement, which the Senate approved and put into force at its meeting on October 12, 2021.

Together we shape the future

Application-oriented teaching, learning and education are our central task. We help shape the future of society and of our students and assume this responsibility holistically and collectively. In doing so, we advance current and socially relevant topics and apply ourselves professionally and competently with our diverse personalities. To do this, we draw on our background of experience in both academia and business. As teachers, we focus on the development of our students' competencies. We start with their individual circumstances in each case. We challenge and encourage students to perform beyond the scope of their studies and recognize special achievements. We encourage students to realize their own ideas, e.g. as founders, and accompany them in this process. As students, we share responsibility for our studies, among other things through active participation and constructive feedback. The fulfillment of further tasks of the university should essentially support and enrich application-oriented teaching, learning and education.

Teaching, learning, exchanging ideas – on-site and virtually

As a face-to-face university, we stand for a contemporary teaching and education concept. Our campus is the most important space for teaching, learning and the exchange of ideas. With didactic considerations in mind, we incorporate digital formats and open up the space for new teaching, learning and examination scenarios. In this way, we enable students, including those in special circumstances, to be more flexible in terms of time and space and make a contribution to the internationalization of teaching and learning.

Well on the way on an international and intercultural level

As an international university that prepares its students for a global job market, we strongly encourage the international mobility of our students, faculty, and staff. To the same extent, in the course of "internationalization at home", we create an environment in which students, teachers and researchers from all over the world feel at home and which enables all members of the university to have a wide variety of international and intercultural experiences. At the same time, we are regionally anchored, meet the existing opportunities with appreciation and work together on the common development. For the application-oriented qualification of our students, we cooperate with companies at a regional, national, and international level.

Diverse, enriching – and working as a team

We are open to different orientations, attitudes, lifestyles and ways of doing things and regard them as an enrichment of our university life. We are committed to the compatibility of studying and having a family. We act in mutual respect and use fairness as a benchmark. We exchange ideas openly and on an equal footing and establish and maintain close and intensive contacts beyond university. We take into account the different life situations and work to ensure that the environment we create supports participation. We reflect on our actions and value different perspectives as a source of new approaches and good solutions. We work together as a team beyond professional and organizational boundaries.

Committed, application-oriented, sustainable, concrete

We establish study programs that are in demand by society and develop them further in such a way that they can take up and integrate innovative elements. In doing so, we attach importance to ensuring that the courses offered have an appropriate time perspective in order to make a contribution to societal tasks in the sense of sustainable development. We establish contact with prospective students at an early stage and advertise our programs and the benefits they bring. We act with commitment and are guided by our curiosity and passion. We teach doing research and do research teaching and create the conditions for making this possible. Our teaching imparts basic knowledge and reflects the current state of research. We stand for a methodical and knowledge-oriented acquisition of competencies by students, e.g. by involving them in projects that enable them to pursue an academic career. We create conditions that promote learning by providing application-oriented qualifications, integrating interdisciplinary elements and using contemporary and motivating teaching methods. We thus create the basis for lifelong learning. We design our procedures and processes to be concrete and comprehensible. We implement them in such a way that access is as self-explanatory as possible and processes can generally also be handled digitally by all participants.