Acceptance to IMPRS-HD & admission to Heidelberg University
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Admission for PhD studies involves some bureaucracy. The following steps are involved 1) Acceptance to the IMPRS-HD, 2) Admission to University with 2a) acceptance as PhD student by the Department for Physics and Astronomy, and 2b) enrollment at Heidelberg University. The enrollment 2b) is not mandatory unless required by your visa or your funding source. Update: since April 2018 it is required for all PhD students to enroll. Students with some other contract with Heidelberg university may apply to get exempted from the requirement of enrollment. Note that for enrollment 2b) you need a student visa, however, without enrollment you can't get your visa right away (see below how to resolve this). |
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1) Acceptance to the IMPRS-HD
No real paper work is necessary for admission at IMPRS-HD. Applicants who applied via the IMPRS-HD application procedure and have been offered a position will be asked formally to join the IMPRS-HD upon arrival. |
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2) Admission at Heidelberg University
Admission/enrollment at Heidelberg university goes in two steps. First step is to register at the Department. By the signature of the Dean students become accepted as doctoral student at the Department of Physics and Astronomy. The second step is to register at Heidelberg University and enroll as student. Note that the Department will ask you sign that you will help with teaching. The current teaching duty is at least two "Deputate", meaning two courses each with a formal workload of 2 hours of teaching per week per semester. In addition to that your insititute may ask you to do some more teaching.
If you have applied to IMPRS or the Graduate School HGSFP and are accepted as a IMPRS fellow, that implies 1) that your application material has been evaluated already and 2) that registration at the Department has to be done at the secretariat of HGSFP. The office is at: Graduate School of Fundamental Physics Im Neuenheimer Feld 226, room 02.304 69120 Heidelberg When you go there, you must take with you: 1) the application forms for Graduate School and University, incl. the signatures from you, your supervisor, and (part of) your thesis committee. This link provides an overview from which you could download the forms. If your documents are not issued in German and English language, you may need certified translations of your documents. The Dean will sign your application form (within about a week). The HGSFP secretariat will then contact you and you could pick up all documents for registration at Heidelberg University. 2b) Enrollment at Heidelberg University Enrollment at the university takes place at the central administration building downtown Heidelberg (close to "Universitaetsplatz"): Seminarstr. 2, 69117 Heidelberg. If you are of non-German citizenship you have to go to the Akademisches Auslandsamt. As a German you should go to the main registration office. The latter is just right from the main entrance, the other is located at the end of the corridor if you go left at the main entrance. Note that there are no deadlines for Ph.D. students, as they may register at any time during the year. At the Akademisches Auslandsamt, you will receive a document which has to be signed and stamped by the Local Foreigners’ Office (Ausländeramt) stating that the student will receive a residence permit once they have enrolled at the University. Please hand in this document and your acceptance letter from the Department at the Local Foreigners’ Office (Ausländeramt). To complete your enrollment, please hand the signed document back to the to the Akademisches Auslandsamt in order to receive your enrollment certificate. With your enrollment certificate, you have to go back to the Local Foreigners’ Office (Ausländeramt) to get your residence permit Here are some papers provided by HD university containing more information about their formalities. Look at the checklist for visa application (in German and in English) and how enrollment depends on you student visa, and checklists for the health insurance (in German and in English and for a private health insurance). All forms and information valid as of Sept. 2016. When you go there, you need to take with you: 1) your original degree certificates & transcripts
In order to get enrolled at HD university you must have a valid student visa. Unfortunately, you will only get this visa if you are enrolled at university ... The procedure is therefore that you have to visit the university office and the visa office twice (in most cases). After your first visit to the enrollment office you will receive a preliminary admission certificate (by postal mail), that you have to show to the visa authorities. The will provide you with a form for the university for enrollment. After full enrollment that you have to go to the visa office again to pick up your visa / residence permit. Even if you don't need a visa, they will first only accept your material for admission, then decide about acceptance and ask you to come again to finialize enrollment. They will tell you which documents to bring (e.g. the health insurance certificate). Benefits from university enrollment When you are enrolled at university and have received your student ID card, you may go and buy your "semester ticket" (167,50 Euro as of 2018) for public transport in the Heidelberg area and use all university services (refectories, accommodation service, email, etc.). More information on fees for study at Heidelberg University can be found here. |
