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Welcome to the DG HochN!
We invite all people and institutions in the higher education system who are committed to more sustainable development of society and of their university in research, teaching, and operations to become part of a large network that constructively accompanies the transformation process by becoming a member of the DG HochN (German Society for Sustainability at Higher Education Institutions; German: Deutsche Gesellschaft für Nachhaltigkeit an Hochschulen e.V.)
Our Mission
The DG HochN supports higher education institutions (HEI) and individual actors who are committed to sustainable development in the higher education system and want to support it through research, transfer and application. It acts as an exchange and expert platform for sustainability at HEI, and connects change agents across organizational and status group boundaries.
Our Network
Our aim is to enable as many German higher education institutions as possible to learn from each other in the context of sustainability and to mutually benefit from experiences. In the DG HochN-network, individual university members, as well as faculties and institutional members, are invited to become involved as members to develop concrete measures for sustainable development in the university system.
DG HochN makes sustainable development visible at higher education institutions in Germany and strengthens sustainability protagonists in the higher education sector through knowledge exchange and joint work. In addition, DG HochN cooperates with other national and international sustainability-oriented networks as well as with representatives from German ministries of higher education.
Our history
The BMBF (Federal Ministry of Education and Research in Germany) funded a large-scale research consortium consisiting of 11 universities called HochN (‘Sustainability at Higher Education Institutions’, 2016-2021). As a private association, DG HochN continues to maintain the established network and disseminates the materials and findings that were developed in the HochN project.
Join us
DG HochN offers a platform for German higher education institutions of all kinds. We offer services to association members including university administrations, professors, academic or administrative staff as well as students.
What it means to be an institutional member of DG HochN
- Extensive visibility of one's own institutional commitment to sustainability within the German higher education landscape.
- Access to the advisory and expertise pool of sustainable higher education development for all fields of action and topics (sustainability reporting, sustainability management system, sustainability-oriented teaching and research, sustainability governance and transfer)
- Participation in innovative transformation/dialogue spaces (i.e., community hubs) that enable cross-university cooperation in research, teaching, operations, and transfer.
- Support for students and staff committed to sustainability in task-specific networking as well as further education and training on sustainability topics (individual members of institutional members are exempted from membership fees)
Individual members of the DG-HochN benefit from:
- Personal networking and collegial exchange on general and specific issues related to sustainable higher education development.
- Participation in a cross-university community on sustainability in higher education established by DG-HochN
- The opportunity to initiate and participate in DG-Hubs with a wide range of addressee groups.
- Primary access to needs-oriented peer counselling, the HochN-Wiki, as well as another member- and networking options
Documents
DG HochN - Recommendations for Action (2022) - PDF 243 KB
The DG HochN policy hub has published a paper with recommendations for action in April 2021, translated in January 2022.
Universities facing Climate Change and Sustainability (2021, Koerber Foundation / GUC Hamburg) PDF 2.2 MB
Demele, U.; Nölting, B.; Crewett, W.; Georgiev, G. Sustainability Transfer as a Concept for Universities in Regional Transformation—A Case Study. Sustainability 2021, 13, 4956. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13094956
Kahle, J.; Risch, K.; Wanke, A.; Lang, D.J. Strategic Networking for Sustainability: Lessons Learned from Two Case Studies in Higher Education.
Sustainability 2018, 10, 4646.
https://doi.org/10.3390/su10124646
