University of Applied Sciences Ruhr West

Ruhr West University of Applied Sciences is a young public university offering high-quality bachelor’s and master’s programmes in computer science, engineering, mathematics, natural sciences and business administration.

All of our innovative programmes have a strong emphasis on practice and real-world application, giving students the opportunity to gain practical experience by working with one of our many local and regional industry partners.

With two brand new, state-of-the-art campuses in the cities of Mülheim an der Ruhr and Bottrop, Ruhr West is located in the heart of the Ruhr area, one of the world’s foremost industrial regions with a population of about 5.3 million.

Enrolling more than 5,800 students from all over Germany and international students from around the world, Ruhr West is a regionally based university with an international outlook.

At its foundation in 2009, Ruhr West University of Applied Sciences initially opted for an innovative matrix structure. This meant that the university was structured into institutes, degree programmes and services but not into faculties. The idea was to achieve maximum flexibility in terms of having professors from all institutes teach courses across all study programmes without having to observe their ties to a specific faculty. This approach enabled Ruhr West to design interdisciplinary and flexible curricula that could quickly incorporate industry and market needs.

However, working with the matrix also brought on some major challenges, most importantly the need for extensive coordination due to the high number of decision-makers involved. Moreover, it was more difficult for students to participate in university governance, for instance by serving on faculty councils.

That is why Ruhr West, after performing an extensive internal and external analysis, decided to move from a matrix structure to a matrix-assisted faculty structure in April 2012. The existing institutes were retained but grouped into four faculties, serving as competence clusters within each faculty. Each degree programme is now assigned to one of the four faculties.

The transition to this more traditional structure took place under the condition that professors are still able to teach courses in programmes housed at faculties other than their own. The main difference is that both teachers and students are now assigned to a fixed organisational unit with a dean as a fixed contact person. Other key features of the matrix structure were retained, such as the centralised allocation of rooms and coordination of cross-faculty teaching.

The Executive Board, consisting of the President, the Head of Administration and Services, the Vice President for Teaching and the Vice President for Research and Transfer, is the university’s main governing body.

The German state of North Rhine-Westphalia in general and the Ruhr region in particular have a dense and diverse network of excellent research universities and universities of applied sciences. In 2007, the state government decided to establish even more universities of applied sciences, calling on NRW cities to submit competitive proposals.

In early 2008, a project group of the city of Mülheim drafted a first proposal for a new university of applied science; in the summer, the neighbouring city of Bottrop officially joined the applicant consortium. In November 2008, the NRW state cabinet made its decision, announcing that the new two-campus university of applied science would be built in Mülheim an der Ruhr and Bottrop.

On 1 May 2009, Hochschule Ruhr West (HRW), or Ruhr West University of Applied Sciences, was officially founded as a science and engineering institution. Only a few months later, in September 2009, the university launched its first two degree programmes and welcomed its first students on its interim campuses in Mülheim and Bottrop.

In the years that followed, Ruhr West saw steady and rapid growth, adding four faculties with seven institutes and expanding its academic offerings to a current total of 17 bachelor’s and 5 master’s programmes, including programmes in business administration. After five years, student enrolment was up from 80 in 2009 to more than 4,500 in 2016. Likewise, academic and non-academic staff had grown from 28 to 300.

On 24 October 2014, the university opened its new campus in Bottrop, featuring modern architecture and state-of-the-art facilities and equipment. The Bottrop campus is home to the Institute of Computer Science and the Institute of Energy Systems and Energy Management. In addition to housing lecture halls, a library and a dining hall, the entire building serves as an energy lab to be used for teaching and research.

The new Mülheim campus opened in spring 2016, housing the Institutes of Civil Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Natural Sciences, Measuring and Sensor Technology, and Business Administration. Featuring cutting-edge equipment, lecture halls, a library, a dining hall and a parking deck, it is one of the most modern campus facilities in North Rhine-Westphalia.

The research profile of Faculty 4 has a primary emphasis on practice and application. Research at the Institute of Measuring and Sensor Technology focuses on industrial and medical measuring and sensor technology. The Institute of Natural Sciences is primarily concerned with issues such as micro systems technology and microfluidics, including their applications in medical and chemical analysis and in chemical reactions engineering. The portfolio is supplemented by research in mathematical modelling and computer simulations.