Abstract
The higher education system has undergone radical change in the past two decades not least because it is regarded by the political 'powers that be' as the most important instrument for the pushing through of political ideas. In this case the changes concern practically all areas : student numbers the composition of the student population in general the different higher education institutions and also the structures within these institutions. The fachhochschule was created as a new form of institution to function at a level somewhere between a technical college, polytechnic or specialized university: its exact level varies between institutions and the staff who teach there. Unlike the universities, it is not concerned with research work, but with instruction. It offers short, very school-like courses of study leading to a position in the relevant branches of industry. Its graduates account for about one third of all higher education graduates. The remainder are distributed between regular and technical universities which offer an education on a broad scientific base, although this leads to very long periods of study of up to ten years a unique feature among highly-industrialized countries. Because of the length of these courses, but especially because of a change in the attitudes of the young generation towards their education(causing a run on university places) the universities have been reduced to the status of institution for the masses which will lead in the long term to a decline in standards. At the moment attempts are being made by many diverse means(such as monitoring professors' teaching performance, financial rewards for students who graduate quickly and increasing the number of examinations which may be retaken for 'quick studiers'), to reduce the average duration of study. However, this is counterbalanced by a certain rigidity in the structure of higher education due to a high average age among professors and therefore the universities are scarcely capable of change. Another contributory factor to longer periods of study is the fact that industry and commerce both require from the graduates more and more non-technical supplementary qualifications. ranging from a knowledge of industrial economics to specialized language skills acquired if possible through study in a foreign country. Studies in textile engineering and textile chemistry are possible at universities as well as at the Fachhochschulen, although the graduates thus educated are employed in very different ways. In the textile industry and in the textile-oriented industries, the highest positions in technical and general management are taken up by university graduates. Most of the Fachhochschule graduates, on the other hand, become active in the production side. There are only a few towns with technical and regular universities that offer a specialization in textile engineering or textile chemistry within a course of mechanical engineering, process engineering or general chemistry. However, the time devoted to textile subjects in the entire study is very small. They are not so much meant to give a professional qualification for the textile sector, but rather to make students aware that in these institutions, which are in general combined with industrial research institutes, they can write their graduate and post-graduate theses. A profession in the textile sector is possible only on completion of this work. The main burden of an education in textile engineering and textile chemistry is, however, carried by the Fachhochschulen, which offer a wide range of different studies. Within these studies, the portion occupied by textile-oriented subjects is aimed both quite considerably and specifically at the different branches of the textile industry: for example, the production of yarns and fabrics, textile wet-processing, and non-woven technology, etc. In spite of dwindling numbers of employees in general, it is the declared aim of the textile industry to win more and more highly-qualified personnel ('more heads, less hands') in view of the growing automation of the processes of textile manufacture and increasing orientation towards exports. At the end of the eighties, it was believed that this aim could not be realized due to insufficient numbers of textiles graduates from the Fachhochschulen and universities. Since then, however, the demand forecasts of the textile industry have been proven wrong. Since mid-1991, the textile industry has undergone another economic recession. At the moment, numbers of higher education graduates and the demand from industry balance each other out. In the light of a widespread crisis in higher education, the following contribution will serve to support these general statement, with the aid of diverse statistics. However, it is necessarily limited to the area formerly known as West Germany. In the former East Germany, restructuring measures are still progressing rapidly : statistics which retain their validity for longer than one day are scarcely available.