More than 200 Syrians have received funding support for their studies in Germany via the ‘Leadership for Syria’ programme, which was officially concluded in April. New initiatives to support Syrian students are currently being discussed. 

Leadership for Syria was launched by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) in coordination with Germany’s foreign affairs ministry in late 2014. Christian Hülshörster, director of the Scholarships Programmes Southern Hemisphere at the DAAD, received around 5,000 applications for support.

“At the time we conceived the programme, the idea was to develop an initiative to address an elite in Syrian society that would one day make a significant contribution to the reconstruction and rehabilitation of the country on the basis of students’ training and education here in Germany,” Hülshörster explains. “We weren’t aware then that this day would be so far off.” 

Applicants included Syrians already studying in Germany but in need of financial support to continue, Syrian refugees and Syrians living in other countries. The applications were reviewed by 30 lecturers from various German universities who then met personally with 445 shortlisted applicants in Istanbul, Beirut, Amman, Cairo and Bonn.

Out of the 221 applicants finally chosen for the initiative, 15 were enrolled for bachelor programmes and 156 for masters programmes, while 39 doctoral candidates were supported. With the support of the DAAD information centres and the German diplomatic missions, nearly all of the scholarship holders were able to travel to Germany in June 2015 to attend a three-month language course. 
 

Two-thirds of the students were in engineering and natural science programmes, and around a third in arts and social science programmes. Forty-three per cent of the scholarship holders were women.

Some of the students in the Leadership for Syria programme have already graduated, and a few have now found employment in Germany. None of them have plans for an immediate return to Syria, although many have expressed a desire to contribute the skills they have acquired to the reconstruction and rehabilitation of their country once the war is over. The DAAD is backing the participants in the programme with further advice as they enter their careers. 

“The scholarship holders settled in quickly at the German universities, and they have now laid the foundations for a successful career,” said DAAD President Margret Wintermantel at the programme’s closing event in Berlin. “They are an example of how education can enable integration. Once the war in Syria has ended, they will be able to make a substantial contribution to developing their country’s future.”

Leadership for Syria was funded by the foreign affairs ministry via the DAAD and by North Rhine-Westphalia’s higher education ministry with a total of €18 million (US$22 million). An accompanying programme familiarising the masters students and the doctoral candidates with the political, academic and economic structures of liberal-democratic systems was a key element of the initiative.

Further support for Syrian students is being discussed by the DAAD and the foreign affairs ministry. However, details have not been announced yet.