Bachelor Social pedagogy and organisational studies

The BA degree course "Social pedagogy and organisational studies" is admissions-restricted and is targeted towards students who wish to acquire basic scientific knowledge on social and organisational pedagogic relationships within a total of sixteen modules (Major degree course) or six modules (Minor degree course).

This is aimed at the following main accupations/professions that, according to previous experience, are open to gratuates of the academic Major degree courses in Educational Science: Areas of social pedagogy (here in particular responsible positions in child and youth welfare and adjacent sectors of contemporary social work), and areas of personnal and organisational development, with particular regard to areas of adult and further education.

In the modules of the Bachelor degree course students acquire the basic competence, within the particularities and limitations, terminologies and cotrines, to orientate themselves along the profile development in the area of changes of individuals in and through social and pedagogic organisations. As such, students become acquainted with the fundamental reflection and research status with regard to the occupations/professions mentioned, and to tap more closely their educational and social scientific frameworks.

The thus-acquired skills of reception and initial critical (re-)constructive questioning of broad contemporary pedagogic and social scientific knowledge represent a prerequisite for a targeted and reflected implementation of ideas and professional-institutional techniques in the above-mentioned professional fields, but also for an interpretative reflection of the limited technicalisation of just these professions.

The three modules of Philosophy of Education offer an introduction into the conditions, particularities and techniques of scientific reflection and knowledge production, as well as basic theories of cultural and social issues. In the third study year moreover, organised and symbolic practices of education, care and professionalism of related organisational-pedagogic measures are reflected.

The five modules of Social Pedagogy analyse the active interplay between professionalism, organisationality and target group definitions in socio-political fields and orientate themselves towards the triad of institutions, professions and recipients, which is common in the socio-pedagogic specialist discourse. Here, legal and institutional particularities of social work play an initial role in the first study year. In the second study year, a total of three modules offer an introduction into prevalent occupational profiles and theories, into professional theories and concepts for action, and into basic research results regarding socio-pedagogic recipients and their targeting by social pedagogy. Finally, in the third study year, the focus is on transitions as particularly decisive perspectives of professional-institutional social pedagogy.

The three modules of Organisational Pedagogy provide an introduction into basic concepts and the history of pedagogic organisations during the first study year. In the second study year, students are acquainted with organisational theories and basic institutional theory; this is followed in the third study year by a combination module with General Pedagogy, which reflects organised and symbolic practices of education, care und professionalism (see above).

In addition to these three main strands of the degree course, the students take a module during the first semester in methods in empirical social research, as well as the modules in the compulsory external subjects of psychology and sociology. From the third to the fifth semester, they complete a course-related internship with a duration of a total of at least eight weeks, as well as preparatory and follow-up exercises. In the fifth semester, they complete an additional module in culture and scientific sociology/gender studies. The degree course is concluded in the sixth semester with a BA dissertation and accompanying colloquium.

With a view to systemic competences, the students thus acquire an awareness of dealing with the complexity of case-specific problem situations in a reflected manner, and having to take scientifically substantiated decisions on the basis of limited information. With regard to communication skills, the study course teaches students to keep information available, by enabling them to convey information clearly and comprehensibly in the form of presentations, to exchange ideas about problems and their solutions on a professional-scientific level, and to take responsibility in the practical implementation in teams.