Information Center for Education

The Information Center for Education (IZB) and the Research Library for the History of Education (BBF) jointly constitute the national centre for research and information infrastructures for educational science and educational research in Germany. Besides working on contents, the Center is particularly engaged in coordinating tasks.

About

The Information Center for Education collaborates with different networks to provide a broad scope of infrastructures. Particular focus lies on the delivery and transfer of literature information, support in assessing, processing and archiving research data, and making available information on the education system in Germany. Furthermore, the Center offers technological support for research activities. Accompanied by comprehensive transfer activities, the infrastructures are implemented in the context of national and international cooperations, and are further developed according to research needs. To this end, the Center conducts research in its own right, and communicates with the relevant scientific community.

The Information Center for Education offers key research and information infrastructures, such as the German Education Server (Deutscher Bildungsserver), the German Education Portal (Fachportal Pädagogik) with the German Education Index (FIS Bildung Literaturdatenbank) and the OpenAccess document server peDOCS as well as the Research Data Centre (Forschungsdatenzentrum (FDZ) Bildung), which, as part of a research data alliance, prepares scientific data for re-usage. The liaison office International Cooperation in Education (ice) promotes and supports networking of German educational researchers, and the Centre for Technology-Based Assessment (TBA Centre) develops and delivers software tools for the design and analysis of computer-based tests.

Activities at the Information Centre for Education are monitored and advanced on the basis of its own research in the areas of information management, eHumanities and Educational Technologies, as well as in close cooperation with partner universities in Darmstadt, Hildesheim and Frankfurt am Main. The Information Center for Education focuses its fundamental and application-oriented research on the thematic areas of Open Science and Digital Education.

Department Units

German Education Server

The central internet guide to the entire education system in Germany collates and edits all relevant internet resources on the topic of education. The service is closely linked to decentralised education portals of the federal states and diverse (formerly) publically-funded portals, both at a technical level, and by the shared use of contents.

Research Data for Education

Activities in the area of research data for education constitute a core element of the entire Institute’s strategic priority Research Data for Educational Research. The Research Data Centre has a remit to archive and deliver research data for education in a legally certain, user-friendly way. As part of a research data alliance funded by the BMBF (Verbund Forschungsdaten Bildung), DIPF acts as coordinator for the development of an efficient, decentralised research data infrastructure for educational research. In particular, the alliance targets the construction of a central national research and referatory structure.

Technology Based Assessment

The department places a particular focus on support systems for empirical educational research and the delivery of instruments in the context of large-scale assessments, as well as competence and individual measurement. Respective activities are run by the Centre for Technology-Based Assessment (TBA Centre), for which the Information Center for Education and the Department of Educational Quality and Evaluation are jointly responsible. The TBA Centre develops and provides software tools for the design and analysis of computer-based tests.

International Cooperation in Education

The liaison office International Cooperation in Education supports empirical educational researchers and educational institutions in Germany in taking up and strengthening international cooperations and projects.

Educational Technologies

The research unit Educational Technologies focuses on the area of Learning Analytics, that is the analysis of data from educational processes. The objective is to gain insights concerning the education system and individual teaching and learning processes, which also allow for the establishment of personalised learning arrangements.

Information Management

The research unit Information Management focuses on user research and monitoring of educational research.

eHumanities

The unit participates in the interdepartmental priority area of research data and focuses on Digital Humanities.

Computer Science in Education

The cross-sectional unit Computer Science in Education unites information technology capacities. It caters to the needs and requirements of the other, content-oriented units of the Information Center. Moreover, the unit acts as a service provider to interdepartmental cooperations of the Institute. Its foci lie on portal technology, data management and software development.

Management

Director

Prof. Dr. Marc Rittberger

Heads of Units

Dr. Doris Bambey, Research Data for Education
Dr. Hendrik Drachsler, Educational Technologies
Axel Kühnlenz, German Education Server
Dr. Paul Libbrecht, Computer Science in Education / Technology Based Assessment (IZB)
Prof. Dr. Marc Rittberger, Information Management / eHumanities
Dr. Christoph Schindler, Literature Information Systems