"Lusatia needs bright minds": Sparkasse Niederlausitz sponsors the children's and pupils' university at BTU

The Chairman of the Board of the Sparkasse Niederlausitz, Lothar Piotrowski, and the Vice President for Studies and Teaching of the BTU Cottbus-Senftenberg, Prof. Dr. Peer Schmidt, signed the new funding agreement on May 4, 2023 in the gymnasium of the Regenbogen-Grundschule Senftenberg. The mayor of Senftenberg, Andreas Pfeiffer, underlined the importance of the funded junior projects for the city with his participation.

The Sparkasse Niederlausitz will provide funding of 35,000 euros each for the school years 2022/23, 2023/24 and 2024/25, making a total of 105,000 euros.

Prof. Dr. Peer Schmidt expressed his sincere thanks to Sparkasse Niederlausitz for its valuable support of the BTU's projects for young scientists. He went into detail about the diverse topics in the program of the Children's University, of which he himself was a speaker several times, and pointed out the possibility of switching to the Pupils' University after the Children's University. Likewise, the BTU vice president thanked the principal of the Rainbow Elementary School Regina Jänke for supporting the current event. "We cordially invite you to come to the university for the Kinderuni lectures," he said in conclusion to the more than one hundred third and fourth grade students* present.

Lothar Piotrowski emphasized that the Sparkasse Niederlausitz has supported the BTU's projects for young researchers with a total of 630,000 euros over the course of many years since 2007. "This is money well spent" emphasized the Chairman of the Board of the Sparkasse. "Lusatia needs bright minds. Imparting knowledge can also be fun. These are events for the future, and the future is you."

The pupils as well as their teachers experienced the Children's University lecture "Are bacteria really little monsters?" by Dr. Barbara Hansen, who heads the biotechnology course at the BTU. This lecture, which has been repeatedly requested and updated to this day, was the starting point of the Children's University in Senftenberg in 2005. After students from the "Fröhlich" music school had given samples of their skills at the start of the event, the third and fourth graders from the elementary school provided an atmospheric finale with the school's own anthem - the rainbow song.

Background
As a credit institution under public law and an active promoter of education, Sparkasse Niederlausitz, which has close ties to the region, has supported the BTU's intensive work with young talent at the Senftenberg campus for many years. In October 2007, for example, it joined forces with the university to launch the Science Academy - an attractive program for young people from the seventh grade upwards, with laboratory practicals, workshops, lectures, and also meetings with successful graduates in companies in the region, which is now part of the School University. Against the background of structural change and the need for skilled workers, the aim is to get students interested in science and research at an early age.
Every year, many hundreds of pupils in grades three to six take advantage of the university's offerings. The sponsorship by the Sparkasse Niederlausitz makes the wide range of exciting lectures, workshops and excursions to companies and institutions possible, from which the children and young people benefit greatly. In the past difficult years of the Corona epidemic, the children's and pupils' university of the BTU Cottbus-Senftenberg was one of the few such offers in Germany that was not only continued, but also further developed with new online formats. Currently back in presence, the projects often offer supplementary opportunities for online participation for interested parties who cannot be on site. The projects are organized by the team of the BTU's Central Student Advisory Service. The establishment of the teacher training program at the Senftenberg campus in the upcoming winter semester is also expected to provide a further boost to the development of the children's and pupils' university.

Further information: https://www.b-tu.de/unileben/btu-region-erleben/kinder-jugendprojekte