Sustainability

The Sustainability Award honors outstanding final theses (Bachelor's or Master's theses) whose research subject deals theoretically or practically with the study of sustainable development and/or climate impact (adaptation). The call for proposals explicitly includes theses that deal not only with ecological but also with economic and social aspects of sustainable development and climate change.

The call is explicitly addressed to students of all faculties. The prize will be awarded during the faculty ceremony on graduation day.

The prize is endowed with 400 €.

In the context of societal transformation towards sustainable development, universities play a central role in accompanying the societal discourse through research and teaching. The Sustainability Award creates incentives for scientific discussion of sustainable development issues at an early stage of qualification and makes existing teaching and research visible to society.

Who can apply

Applications are open to students and former students who have written their thesis at Bielefeld University in the past two academic years (e.g. October 1, 2021 to September 30, 2023) with a grade of at least Good (2.0). Students should be explicitly encouraged to apply by their examiners and supported in the application process.

The application should include a cover letter which should

• briefly describes the research topic of the thesis
• the procedure and central findings,
• as well as a self-assessment of the relevance of the research in relation to research on sustainable development and/or climate impact (adaptation).

This is supplemented by a short letter of recommendation from the examiner, which assesses the scientific level as well as the relevance of the work. In addition, a digital copy of the thesis must be attached.

Application procedure

The application should include the following documents:

• Cover letter (or abstract) addressing the above criteria.
• Letter of recommendation from the supervisor(s)
• (preliminary) diploma
• digital copy of the thesis

The application documents including the copy of the thesis should be sent in electronic form as one PDF file to nachhaltigkeitsbuero@uni-bielefeld.de by 30.09.2023.

Selection procedure

The applications will be evaluated by a jury consisting of members of the university management, the Sustainability Office and two Researchers currently conducting thematic research on sustainability.

For the evaluation of the applications, only the jury will have access to the final theses. There will be no further publication or dissemination of the thesis or the accompanying documents (in whole or in part) without the consent of the authors.