Advances and perspectives of competence research in higher education – Report on the German KoKoHs program

Abstract

Higher education in Germany is characterized by specific historicalcultural traditions stemming from von Humboldt’s humanistic understanding of education. In this context, higher education focuses on a variety of multi-perspective goals. Accordingly, higher education focuses on both the acquisition of knowledge and skills in specific domains (e.g., medicine, economics) and on the development and promotion of generic (interdisciplinary) skills (e.g., problem solving, critical thinking), whereby the latter aspect is becoming increasingly more important in the 21st century. This paper analyses ten years of competence research in higher education in germany, and considers advances and perspectives.