Tenure Track at Friedrich Schiller University

A Tenure-Track professorship may be the ideal entrance to a career as an academic professor. It is possible to apply to a W1 professorship as early as in the first few years after you complete your doctorate or PhD - without the usual German qualification steps such as Habilitation or equivalent performances. If a junior professorship bears the addition "Tenure Track", this means that after the passing of a six-years tenure, the candidate has the oppportunity to gain a full and permanent W2 or W3 professorship, as "Tenure Track" equals the binding agreement that, after a successful intermediate and final evaluation, the professorship is turned from a time-limited to a permanent contract. For the assessment of the junior professor in the intermediate evaluation (after 3 to 4 years) and the tenure evaluation (after 5 years), there will be criteria determined as early as during the appointment procedures. These criteria have to be fulfilled by the candidate before the end of the respective period. An evaluation committee (similar in structure to appointment commitees) will then decide whether the criteria have been fulfilled successfully. If the evaluation of the tenure candidate is positive, their position will be turned from time-limited to permanent.

Next to the option of a W1 Professorship on Tenure Track, there is also the possibility to appoint a W2 Professorship on Tenure Track. Here, the usual appointment criteria for the professorship will be demanded. With a time-limited W2 Professorship, Tenure Track means that the university agrees to turn the professorship into a permanent W2 or W3 position after a successful completion of the tenure.

In Germany, there has been the option to apply tenure track to new professoral appointments since 2002. Throughout the first years, the model was rarely applied. Since 2017, the Tenure-Track Programme of German Bund and Lander has allowed for a multitude of additional tenure track professorships. It is the aim of the German Tenure-Track System to appoint scientists to professorships at an earlier stage in their academic career and give them the opportunity of a permanent and reliable employment position already with their initial appointment.

Friedrich Schiller University has implemented the tenure-track professorship career path on a sustainable basis. The tenure-track statutespdf, 280 kb · de regulate appointment and evaluation procedures. A mentoring system and a qualification programme support the tenure-track professors. The University of Jena aims to permanently announce 15% of all professorships with tenure track.

On the following pages you will find information on the tenure-track professorship at the Friedrich Schiller University and on the support services and contact persons for tenure-track professors.