For the first time in its history, the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) is offering a purely digital scholarship programme. This new programme enables young people to study a digital master’s degree course abroad. Financed by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), the pilot programme is intended in particular to appeal to students who would formerly have waived the opportunity of a stay abroad for health or family reasons.

‘Experience during the COVID-19 pandemic indicated that digital formats ensure access for students to high quality international courses. We therefore want to use this new programme to create greater diversity and equal opportunity in terms of access to international courses’, said DAAD President Professor Joybrato Mukherjee. 

The new programme is directed at students who have already received their bachelor's degree certificate or are just about to graduate at that level. This programme will give them the opportunity of attending an international higher education institution to take a master´s degree course that is provided either completely in a digital format or via so-called blended learning, in other words learning via electronic and online media as well as phases of traditional face-to-face teaching. Scholarship holders can study full-time or part-time to enable them to better reconcile their studies and family commitments.

In addition to a monthly scholarship instalment, students who are beneficiaries will also receive grants towards their tuition fees at international higher education institutions. In the case of study programmes in a blended learning format, they can receive grants for travel and subsistence expenses up to three times a year to take part in the phases of traditional face-to-face teaching. The DAAD is thus creating an offer that is unique in Germany. Given its flexibility, it is in particular intended to encourage those students to participate in academic international mobility who would have felt little attraction to do so in the past. This applies for instance to students with children, those with commitments to care for relatives, with disabilities or chronic illnesses.

The programme is open to applicants from all fields of study who are pursuing a full master's degree at an international higher education institution. Artistic subjects and architecture are the only exceptions. The programme is open to study programmes worldwide. The initial plan is to award around 30 scholarships a year.