July 10-20, 2011
Otzenhausen, Germany
The German-Russian Summer School for BA students was organized in cooperation with the ASKO Foundation and the European Academy Otzenhausen with additional financial support from the Bundeszentrale fuer politische Bildung and Stiftung Deutsch-Russischer Jugendaustausch. This new activity and cooperation proved to be successful and useful. The target group basically consisted in German and Russian BA students. The Russian students were selected through a call for applications distributed among different faculties of St. Petersburg State University. In total, 39 applications from 10 faculties of the University (Sociology, Philosophy, Journalism, Law, Liberal Arts and Sciences, Psychology, Economics, History, International Relations, Political Science) were received. As result, the 16 best applications were selected from 9 faculties.
The German students came from different universities of Germany. The goal of the Summer School was to give the participants a better understanding of the European and Russian politics in an international atmosphere and mutual learning from each other. The focus was on the comparison on how policies in different contexts are formulated, how politics are implemented and how political identities are built. Moreover, the mutual intercultural understanding and networking of the students was also achieved through the common group work, discussions and other interactive activities. In the framework of the Summer School, the following topics were discussed during the lectures and workshops: European Integration History, Integration and Identity, History of the Interregional Cooperation: Region SaarLorLux, EU Political System and Policy-Making in the EU, EU External Policies and EU-Russian Relations, European Energy and Climate Policy, and WTO Functioning. All the topics were discussed with German professors and experts and trained during the
workshops.
Moreover, some important excursions were organized to European political institutions: the participants visited The Court of Justice of the EU in Luxemburg, The European Parliament and the Council of Europe in Strasburg. The excursions contributed to the better understanding of the EU institutional system. Feedback from the participants showed that the Summer School was useful and successful, and that such Summer Schools for BA-students are necessary in order to give undergraduate students an early insight into Germany- and European-related issues and to motivate their further interest in this field of study. This fact, as well as a high number of good applications, showed that these types of schools are very fruitful for German and Russian undergraduates and should be continued if possible. Since also the organization partners have evaluated the school as very successful the next Summer School is planned for July 2012.