Klaus Tschira Foundation
The Klaus Tschira Stiftung (KTS) is a German Foundation established by the physicist Klaus Tschira in 1995 as a non-profit organization. Its primary objective is to support projects in natural and computer sciences as well as mathematics. The KTS places strong emphasis on the public understanding in these fields. Klaus Tschira’s commitment to this objective was honored in 1999 with the "Deutscher Stifterpreis" by the German National Academic Foundation (German: Studienstiftung). The KTS is located at the Villa Bosch in Heidelberg, Germany, the former residence of Nobel Prize laureate for chemistry Carl Bosch (1874–1940).
Activities
The foundation mainly sets off academic and non-profit, non-academic research projects in natural sciences, computer sciences and mathematics. It supports teaching and research at public and private universities as well as projects with children and young people.
Its main goal is to arouse public appreciation for natural sciences, to practice research for the society and to present science in an understandable format for the general public. Furthermore, upon application, the foundation supports projects in line with the mission of the foundation. The main dedication of the organization is described by three fields:
- Fascinating Sciences
- Research For Society
- Understandable Science.
In 2013, the Klaus Tschira Stiftung established the Heidelberg Laureate Forum Foundation (HLFF). The HLFF organizes the annual Heidelberg Laureate Forum, an event in Heidelberg, which gives a select group of young researchers the opportunity to meet pre-eminent scientists from the fields of mathematics and computer science.
Science for young people
The foundation induces children and young people to be enthusiastic and curious about natural phenomena.
Forscherstation
The Forscherstation is the Klaus Tschira Competence Centre for Early Science Education. It wants to instill kindergarten children and their nursery nurses with enthusiasm for natural sciences. Children are supposed to playfully explore natural phenomena from their direct environment. The explorer station is a research facility of the college of education Heidelberg. It also investigates the effects of the further training on the teacher’s development of competence and the children’s learning processes.
GIS-Station
The GIS-Station is the Klaus Tschira Competence Centre for digital geographical media. It offers learning opportunities in the fields of remote sensing, geographical information systems or GPS. Therewith the station wants to support teacher’s and student’s competence in the use of digital geographical media. It is assumed that digital geographical media will help students to better explore the earth and the facets of global change. The project is attended by the college of education Heidelberg.
Explore Science
Every year since 2006, the Klaus Tschira Foundation has been hosting science adventure days in Luisenpark, in Mannheim. Children, students, teachers and parents can go on a natural scientific expedition with competitions for students, oral presentation, also with experiments and hands-on exhibitions. A different scientific theme is chosen for Explore Science each year.
Research
Another main goal of the foundation’s work is the use of research results for the benefit of society. Therefore, the foundation supports young academics, does its own research and sponsors projects of other institutions which were initiated by the Klaus Tschira Foundation.
Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies
In January 2010, the Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies (HITS) opened its doors as the follower of the European Media Laboratories (EML) Research, which was found in 2003. The sister institute of the application-oriented EML has the agenda to do long-term oriented, fundamental scientific research which is supposed not to follow a fashion. The investigators come from the following fields: life sciences, scientific databases and computational linguistics, theoretical astrophysics, statistic methods and computational sciences. In the future, up to ten research groups are supposed to represent HITS. The institute pursues an interdisciplinary and cooperative approach.
Klaus Tschira Laboratory
The Klaus Tschira Laboratory for physical age determination is an institution of the Reiss Engelhorn Museum Mannheim and a related institute of the University of Tübingen. Humanistic considerations about the dating of artwork are examined with the aid of natural scientific methods like radiocarbon dating.
Understandable science
To support the common comprehension of natural sciences, the Klaus Tschira Foundation supports journalists and scientists at developing communicative skills in this matter.
KlarText!
Since 2006, the Klaus Tschira Stiftung is looking for young scientists who write a generally understandable article (8,000 to 10,000 words) in German about their research and the content of their PhD thesis. The prize is awarded in each of the categories biology, chemistry, information technology, mathematics, neurosciences and physics as well as in closely related fields. Participation is open to young scientists who were graduated previous year with excellent research results. Contributions are judged for scientific quality and public understanding by a panel of experts on science and communication, respectively. With this competition, the Klaus Tschira Stiftung pursues the goal to advance public appreciation of nature sciences, mathematics and information technology. The ability to communicate is fundamental to make innovative research findings accessible to an interested but rather unspecialized public. Yearly, up to six winners receive the award endowed with prize money of € 5,000. Furthermore, the prize-winning contributions are released in the supplementary issue of the popular science magazine Bild der Wissenschaft (German). All competitors are offered a participation in a one-day workshop for science communication. The Klaus Tschira Prize was first awarded during 1996 to 1999, but was regionally restricted to graduates from the University of Karlsruhe. The competition was revived in 2005 and since 2006 announced nationwide.
NaWik
The National Institute for Science Communication (NaWik) trains students and scientists for the dialogue with the general public. The NaWik is an institute of the Klaus Tschira Stiftung and the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology.