Comprehensive evaluation of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research's support for gifted young people in the 'Vocational Talents' programme

Lifelong learning and further education are important building blocks for the professional success and personal development of each individual. Against this background, the BMBF has developed two different measures to support particularly gifted individuals in their professional or academic further education: The program 'Support for the Gifted – Vocational Training - Continuing Education Grant', which was introduced in 1991, and the 'Advancement Grant' program, which was launched in 2008. In order to be able to further develop the funding activities, the Institute for Innovation and Technology (iit) of the VDI/VDE Innovation + Technik GmbH, Berlin, in cooperation with the Research Institute for Education and Social Economics (FiBS), Berlin, was commissioned with the overall evaluation of these two programs. The task of the evaluation is to examine the content-related and conceptual effectiveness of the funding. The goal is to develop recommendations for further development of the funding activities. To this end, reports, documentation and preliminary studies will be analyzed and existing and new statistical data will be evaluated. The spectrum of the groups of people to be interviewed ranges from scholarship holders to persons in charge in the chambers of commerce and responsible offices to experts in vocational training and personnel managers in companies. Both quantitative and qualitative methods will be used.