5/28/2009

Welcome

Welcome to this site!

This site provides information on how to enroll as a PhD student at the University of Hamburg. The information given in the site will be based on the current application and admission practices of the University. The site will also have useful links to other web-pages where one could get even more information.

When people start thinking of doing a PhD study, there is always a need for information. Some of the most frequent questions that arise are: What should I do first? Where do I get information? How and where do I apply? What documents do I need?

It is especially hard if one is a foreign student and is trying to start a PhD study at the University of Hamburg. The major problem is the language. Given most foreigners who come to Hamburg to study have a relatively good knowledge of German, it is still difficult to get the necessary information, because of the lack of knowledge about the German education system.

The aim of this website is, therefore, to ease the above mentioned difficulties by providing information about how to start a doctoral study at the University of Hamburg.

The information given in this website is helpful for people who are currently:

  • abroad (European Union (EU) or non-EU citizens) and would like to conduct a PhD study at the University of Hamburg

  • in Hamburg and/or regular students of the University of Hamburg and intend to start a PhD study in the University.

You can, and hopefully will, leave your comment about the site. This will enable us to establish some communication and sharing some more experiences that perhaps could be of use for other visitors of the site.



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5/27/2009

About the site

This website was first developed by Miguel A. Buitrago (who was a PhD student and SPAS, “Leistungsstipendienprogramm für ausländische Studierende”, scholarship holder) in 2006 to provide information on how to become a doctoral student at the University of Hamburg, Germany, based on his own experience.

The information is written in English to allow as many people as possible to take advantage of it, with the assumption that most foreign students speak English.

The need to update the website arose from the fact that the admission and registration process of the University of Hamburg has been changed. For instance, now the application form has to be filled online although there is still a need to submit the printed version. In addition, the responsible people and their offices, addresses and office hours have also been changed. The website has therefore been updated in 2011 by PhD students (of the University of Hamburg) and PIASTA's scholarship holders. More about PIASTA: www.uni-hamburg.de/piasta



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5/26/2009

Planning a PhD

Contrary to the US and the UK, where one has to enroll in a program, take classes, conduct a research and write a dissertation at the end, a PhD student in Germany has to work only on a research project and write the dissertation. However, to be enrolled in the University of Hamburg as a PhD student, you have to take the following steps.

  • The first step is to plan the time of application. You have to keep in mind the admission deadlines of the University in either the winter or the summer semester. You can apply for the winter semester from 1 June to 15 July every year and for the summer semester from 1 December to 15 January. For example, if you want to apply for the winter semester 2011/2012, your application should arrive to the admission office of the University between 1 June and 15 July, 2011. Generally, it is a good idea to plan about half a year earlier. In this society, you really need to learn early planning. Here is a link to the official University dates. There you will find the entire schedule of classes (beginning of classes, vacations, etc.).

  • The third step is to make the application document ready and apply.



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5/25/2009

Things to do before applying

There are several important things to consider before filling an application form for admission. Please also consider the order. It may be possible to do two activities in parallel (for instance, identification of a dissertation topic and finding a supervisor). But one should not think of degree validation/recognition before getting a supervisor and having a concrete idea of what one wants to do.

  1. Identification of a dissertation topic

How do you find a topic? There are several books that will give you an idea on how to do this. "The Craft of Research" by Booth, Colomb and Williams is helpful for getting a research topic. However, one general way of getting a topic is thinking about what you are interested in and asking questions such as HOW, WHY or WHAT.

Discussion with professors and friends might also help in the identification of a PhD research topic. It is also good to look at recommendations of other researchers in the area of your interest.

The topic is a very important part of the application process. Everyone you will talk to will ask about your topic. It is very important that you really think about this carefully. It doesn't need to be ground breaking, it just needs to be mind-boggling.

  1. Finding a supervisor

In the University of Hamburg one needs to have a supervisor (called Doktorvater/Doktormutter or Betreuer/ Betreuerin in German). This is the person under whom you will conduct your research and write your dissertation. S/He supervises your progress, gives you guidance and important advice. Your supervisor has to be a professor at the University of Hamburg. Of course, if your research is a multidisciplinary one, you can possibly have an additional supervisor from any other German university or from any other faculty/institute of the University of Hamburg.

There must be a common ground between his/her research interests and yours. It may be good to look at the website of different departments of the University for the personal web-pages to identify professors who share your research interest. Then, contact and ask them about the possibility of doing your PhD study under their supervision. Contact of contacts can also help in finding a supervisor. That means if you know somebody who knows potential supervisor/s for you, he/she may contact (at least to establish first contact) the professor/s on behalf of you.

This website gives you more information on how to find a supervisor and choose a PhD topic.

  1. Recognition or validation of your degree

If you have a degree, like a masters or other kind of degree from a university outside Germany, you have to think about the recognition process. To do this you have to first identify a responsible person in the faculty in which you are going to conduct your PhD study. Here: http://www.verwaltung.uni-hamburg.de/campuscenter/download/fachberaterlisten/index.html you will find out who is responsible for this purpose in your respective faculty. Try to find out the complete information on how to reach him/her including office hours. It might also be useful to contact the person before going physically to know exactly what documents you should take with you. Of course your supervisor or his/her secratary might also help you in finding this person

These people check the equivalence of your degree with the degrees offered in Germany and carefully look at the courses that you took during your previous studies. Based on their result, they may say that the degree is equivalent and the courses that you took are enough. Or if they feel that you lack some background in the area, they may require you to take some more courses.


  1. Level of your German language competence

Many foreign students have to have a proficient level of German to even start any studies in the university. Luckily, English is the second scientific language in Germany and if you speak English you have one relatively less hurdle to pass. The dissertation can be written in English. Any way, you have to proof that either you have a German language competence enough for writing your dissertation or that you will write it in English (based on your agreement with your supervisor).

But, even if you write your dissertation in English, the need for German language for your daily life is unquestionable. So it is advisable to have at least a basic level of German. After all, you are in Germany and the language here is German. There is no way out :-).


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5/24/2009

The application process

The application process varies depending on the citizenship of the applicant. The information is, therefore, organized according to citizenship.

  1. German or foreigners from EU countries

Currently enrolled as a student at the University of Hamburg - re-enrollment (German: “Umschreibung”)

It seems that the process is easy for students who are already enrolled at the University of Hamburg. If you are a student at the university and want to continue your PhD study, you need to submit an application to “Campus Center” within a month after completing your study. If you would like to have a complete address, here it is.

Campus Center

Alsterterasse 1

20354 Hamburg

Do you have still some questions? You can ask the responsible person for registration and re-enrollment at the university. Well, if you would also like to know how to reach that person, here is the ServicePoint/ ServiceTelefon and the office hours:


Tel. 040/42838-4208

Office hours: Monday-Wednesday 09-10

Thursday 17-18

For the official information, please check this website.

Currently not enrolled as a student at the University of Hamburg.

If you are not currently enrolled as a student at the University of Hamburg but still want to conduct your PhD here, you need to submit your documents to “Service für Studierende”.

Service für Studierende- Team Bewrbubg und Zulassung

Alsterterrasse 1

20354 Hamburg

"Office hours & Tel.Nr. of Campus Center"

In addition, if you receive your degrees from abroad, your degree has to be recognized by the faculty in which you are going to conduct a PhD study. Look here for how to do this.

Please read more from the official website of the University of Hamburg.

  1. Foreigners from non-EU countries

If you are living currently outside Germany, the most important thing for you to think about is how you will finance your stay in Germany. Before telling you how to apply, here are several ways to finance your PhD study (we do not comment on how to apply for these financing possibilities):

  1. you might get a position to work in a project or as a co-worker (“Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiter”) and have the possibility to conduct your PhD study in parallel.

  2. you may join a PhD program/school (“Graduiertenkolleg”) in your area .

  3. you might apply to the founding organizations.

In the first case, every process related to your PhD may be done after you come to Germany. For you, as you will have closer contact with professors (at least in the area in which you are working), identifying a dissertation topic and finding a supervisor won’t be difficult. Once you did these steps, you can enroll as a PhD student following the procedure which will be described below.

The second case is even easier than the first, because in this case you do not to bother about a dissertation topic and supervisor.

In the third case, you have to first identify a dissertation topic of your interest, prepare a proposal and identify professors (in Hamburg) who have common research interest with you so as to get a supervisor. Most of the time, these things are required to apply for founding. Once you did these, you need to apply to one of the founding organizations in Germany. You have to carefully select a funding organization that is specifically applicable for your situation. What I want to say is that, some of the organizations are limited to a certain field of study, some of them give scholarship only for people coming from some countries, some require you to be at your home country at the time of application (for instance, DAAD), etc. Even some may require you to be admitted to one of the Universities in Germany. Thus, be careful and try to identify such information before you apply! The following sources help you to identify the founding organizations:

http://www.daad.de/deutschland/foerderung/stipendiendatenbank/00462.en.html

http://www.efors.eu/germany-scholarships/

If you succeed to win a scholarship from a founding organization that does not require university admission, you can enroll as a PhD student at the University of Hamburg after coming to Hamburg following the procedure given under the title How to apply.

Actually, it is also possible (following the same procedure) to register as a PhD student being at your home country. This is particularly helpful if you intend to apply to founding organizations that require university admission. But, the process will be easier for you if you do it being in Hamburg.

How to apply

Information is available here.

To use the online application system, however, you need to have an account (“Bewerberaccount”) which you can get by registering on STINE starting from 01.12 and 01.06, for summer and winter semester, respectively under the menu “Bewerberaccount anlegen”. Immediately after the registration, you will receive an email that indicates a user name and password that enables you to use the online application.

If you have question about the content of the online application form and if you could not get the answer from the application information booklet, which is a general booklet for online application you can ask the admission team of the University of Hamburg using this form.

If you have/face technical questions/problems about/with the online application, you can contact the technical team by filling this form or by writing email to uhh.bewerbung-technik@rrz.uni-hamburg.de.

Finally, you need to send the printed version of the online application and the confirmation letter from the health insurance company to the Campus center to the following address.

Service für Studierende- Team Bewerbung und Zulassung

Alsterterrasse 1

20354 Hamburg

From there you should receive a written confirmation and be able to formally enrolled (“immatirikulieren”) to the University.

At the moment (January 2011) at the University of Hamburg, PhD students are not supposed to pay a tuition fee, which undergraduate students have to. But if you want to have a student id-card and a public transportation ticket for a semester with a reduced price, you have to pay a semester fee (which is totally different from the tuition fee). Please check here to get more information about the semester fee.


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3/16/2006

Things to Think About Before Applying
Before we get to the filling of the application, there are several important things to think about.

The first one is your dissertation topic.

How do you find a topic? There are several books that will give you an idea on how to do this. I recommend "The Craft of Research" by Booth, Colomb and Williams. It helped me a lot on getting into the search of my topic. However, one general way of getting a topic is thinking about what you are interested and asking the questions beginning with HOW, WHY or WHAT. Try to think in terms of causation, that is how does this causes that? or why is it that this results on that?

The topic, logically, is a very important part of the application process. Everyone you will talk to will ask about your topic. It is very important that you really think about this carefully. It doesn't need to be ground braking, it just needs to be mind-boggling.

The second thing is the so called "Dr Vater" (Dr Father).

In the University of Hamburg one needs to have a Dr Vater. That would be kind of the chair of your dissertation committee. This is the person under whom you will be writing your work. He supervises your progress and along gives you guidence and some good advice. He has to be a professor from the University.

There needs to be a common ground between his research interests and yours. I would suggest you to look in the university's website for the personal websites of the professors and try to pick a list of five or six. Then, give them a visit or contact them to talk about the possibility of you doing a doctorate under their supervision. Many will turn you down or perhaps you will disqualify them because it is just no match. Hopefully there will be one or two who are able to do it and you like, of course.

The third thing to think about is the recognition or validation of your degree.

If you have a degree, like a masters or other kind of degree from a university outside Germany, you have to think about the recognition process. Usually what you have to do is to go to the faculty in which you want to do your dissertation. For example for me was the faculty of Social Science, and more importantly, the Institute for Political Science. The University of Hamburg is organized into faculties and institutes. So one is a student of a faculty and institute.

Talk first with the people in your respective institute. Try to find out who is the person responsible for the degree recognition. At the same time try to find out what is his name and where is his or her office. This information will be useful to find them in the university's website. If you can, call the person before you go. What usually happens is that they only have certain visit hours when they attend to the public. Often they are in vacation or they simply change their hours. Usually you'll have to make two to three trips before you meet with this person.

Try to be as detailed and explicit as possible so you get to talk with the right person.

Finally, think of the level of your German.

Many foreign students have to have a proficient level of German to even start any studies in the university. Luckily, English is the second scientific language in Germany and if you speak English you have one relatively less hurdle to pass. The dissertation can be written in English, but the rest of the work, talking with professors, going to classes, doing your paperwork, application, dealing with bureaucracy, is done in German. So it is advisable to have at least a basic level of communication in German. After all, you are in Germany and the language here is German. There is no way out. :-)

Give yourself about two years to be somewhat fluent, but not perfect! :-)

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3/08/2006

First Steps
You want to start doctoral studies in the University of Hamburg (Uni-Hamburg for short). You are confused with the German system and you ask yourself: How does it function? Where do I go? How do I start? What do I do?

The first thing to do is to get information. Remember, information is power. There are many questions to be answered first: How does the education system in Hamburg, Germany work? What do they mean by "doctoral studies"? What is the process of getting a doctoral studies in the Uni-Hamburg? What are the "rules"?

Well, for one, one has to know that there is no doctoral program, that I know of, in the Uni-Hamburg. Contrary to the US and the UK, where one has to enroll in a programme where one takes classes and writes the dissertation at the end, one has to work on the dissertation and the research project. So to be a "doktorand" (German for doctoral student), one has just to be writing his or her doctoral dissertation.

Now, it seemed to me that it was superficially easy to do a doctorate in the Uni-Hamburg. Like I said before one just needed to start writing the dissertation and be accepted in the university. But it is a bit more complicated than that.

Once you decide to write a doctoral dissertation, you (a foreign student) have to take several steps.

The first step is to begin planning when will you be applying. Theoretically there is no deadline to apply for a doctorate at the university, as one can apply any time of the year. But, one has to keep in mind nevertheless the admission deadlines in either the Winter-Spring semester or the Summer semester. These dates are as follows: You can apply for the Winter-Spring semester from 1 June to 15 July of every year, for the following semester. For the Summer semester you can apply from 1 December to 15 January, again, for the following year. Generally, I think, it is a good idea to plan about a half a year early to a year. In this society you'll gain many friends if you learn to plan early.

If you are comming from overseas, think about where will you be staying, how expensive is life in Hamburg, medical insurance, possible places for part-time work, etc. In the next year or so I will be writing about some, or all, of these topics in an attempt to provide more information for foreign students who want to do a doctorate in the University of Hamburg.

Now, you have the date when you can apply. The second step is to start planning how to get the application ready.

But, before you send the application read the other posts in this website, as they will be telling you how to go about filling the application, what other documents you need to complete your application package and how to collect them. So read on.....

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