Call for Papers: ZFHE 22/1

Posted on 2026-05-09

Call for Papers: ZFHE 22/1

Educational Processes in Student Learning and Teaching: Contributions from Educational Science to Higher Education Research

Edited by C. Scheid, P. Münte, M.- Groder & F. Lessky

About the Special Issue

Current debates on student learning and teaching are shaped by questions regarding the governability of higher education institutions (Bremer and Lange-Vester, 2022; Krempkow et al., 2021), quality development (Felt and Fochler, 2024; Hagenauer et al., 2018), career structures in the academic system (Krempkow et al., 2025; Schiffecker et al., 2026), the improvement of teaching and learning processes (Geier et al., 2026; Volk et al., 2025), and, in particular, the desired or undesired social composition of the student population (Freitag et al., 2022; Tupan-Wenno et al., 2016). Higher education institutions are primarily viewed through the lens of influenceable input-output relationships, the associated standards of efficiency, sustainability, and diversity, as well as the successful imparting of systematized competencies (Hüther and Krücken, 2016). To achieve these research goals, an interdisciplinary approach within higher education research is essential.

Nevertheless, a look at (sub)disciplinary perspectives can prove beneficial, as they can bring critical and innovative impulses into higher education research based on their specific traditions (Pasternack et al., 2025). From an educational science and educational theory perspective, for example, the question arises as to whether existing, prominent approaches are sufficient to sustainably shape and support the future of the university and higher education institutions. From an educational science and educational theory perspective, higher education institutions are, above all, places where formative educational experiences can be sought and found (Lessky, 2024), and regarding which the question arises as to how higher education institutions facilitate these unique experiences (Nairz-Wirth and Feldmann, 2018; Schäfer, 2023). They are educational institutions where new insights are formulated, where individuals capable of learning engage in an organized manner with scholarship, its texts, modes of argumentation, and subjects, within which correspondingly well-founded processes of self-development, self-shaping, and self-formation can be expected, and which can thus contribute in a special way to scientific discourse as well as to many other social spheres (Nairz-Wirth and Feldmann, 2019; Huber, 2019). These processes, which are scarcely controllable due to their connection to subjects historically constituted in specific ways, are often overlooked in established research approaches, along with their diverse consequences, their specific limitations, and the question of the unique interactive and institutional forms necessary or suitable for these processes.

Making higher education visible, getting to the bottom of it (as the title of the conference from which the contributions gathered here emerged suggests) therefore means taking the experiential and interactive dimensions of university teaching and university life seriously (Scheid et al., 2025). This brings to the fore a perspective that is compatible with classical and modern theories of education and describes the university not only as a system open in principle to control, but also as a specific lifeworld, a space for interaction, and above all a place of living experience. The question of which dimensions of the institution are indispensable in terms of social innovation potential can be discussed more comprehensively by focusing on subject-related processes.

Aims and Objectives of the Special Issue

Higher education research is widely understood as an interdisciplinary field (Pasternack et al., 2025; Bülow-Schramm & Krempkow, 2014; Tight, 2013; Välimaa, 1998). This special issue brings together scholarly contributions that adopt an educational science and educational theory perspective within higher education research and explores the question of what novel and innovative empirical findings and theoretical insights can be gained for the interdisciplinary field of higher education research from such a perspective.

A central gap concerns the question of how the traditional educational concept of “education”—which clearly differs from or even contradicts the psychological or sociological uses of the term (Bergman et al., 2012; Gruschka 2013; Kraler et al., 2025), can be made fruitful in order to understand higher education practice, spaces of experience, and logics of interaction in a different way. While concepts of learning, competence, and output strongly shape research, it often remains unclear how educational processes manifest themselves in their own logic and how events acquire subjective meaning: for instance, in encounters between faculty and students, in the engagement with academic subjects, in the architectural design of spaces, in habitual orientations, in institutional norms, or in biographical self-interpretations.

The articles in this issue build on these considerations and examine how the educational processes presumed to occur at universities can be empirically explored. They examine how subjects change through contact with academia, how academic environments become spaces of education, which actor logics come into play in teaching, and how emergent, unintended, and uncontrollable dynamics can become visible—dynamics whose conditions are the result of political and practical decisions.

Methodologically, the collected contributions are rooted in qualitative social and educational research. This can be justified by the fact that educational processes at universities can only be empirically captured if a methodological approach is chosen that is open to the perspectives of those involved, their experiences, and the structured nature of the social situations that give rise to these experiences. Biographical interviews, interaction transcripts, as well as official documents—provided they are examined from the perspective of their inherent educational relevance—constitute important data sources in this context. In this way, the special issue contributes to the theoretical refinement of the concept of education in the context of higher education research, to making educational perspectives visible, and to their contribution to political-practical considerations aimed at ensuring innovative higher education spaces.

Thematic Approaches of the Contributions

The contributions collected in this issue are characterized by diverse methodological, theoretical, and empirical approaches. What they share, however, is a perspective that understands higher education research not primarily as a program for quality improvement, but as a scientifically grounded reflection on an educational institution whose mission extends beyond the development of socially desirable competencies to include the provision of specific educational experiences rooted in scholarship that capture the educable subject within their individually situated educational process. Against this backdrop, the contributions address subjective educational processes during university studies and students’ self-interpretations (see the contributions by Freudhofmayer; Ivanova; Scheid and Lessky), the logic of interaction in academic teaching and the question of how implicit educational claims manifest themselves there (see Bers; König and Monske, Leonhard and Leonhard; Münte), methodological considerations for capturing emergent educational phenomena (see Balzer and Bellmann; Franzmann; Rhein), and institutional frameworks that enable or limit educational processes (see Behm; Brück-Hübner; Draube; Klotz). They all exemplify how an educational theory perspective can provide new and, above all, genuinely educational science-based impulses within higher education research.

The special issue is thus intended, on the one hand, to promote the interdisciplinary perception of higher education research oriented toward educational science and educational theory, with its methodological contributions. On the other hand, it aims to invite researchers with an educational science and educational theory orientation, as well as decision-makers in committees and organizational roles with a similar orientation, to engage more deeply with the significant field of higher education research as a space for reflective university design. In doing so, the special issue aims to reach not only the ZFHE’s existing readership but also to attract new readers who work on topics related to higher education research but have had little contact with the journal to date due to disciplinary boundaries. The guest editors will achieve this primarily through their university networks and channels in educational science and the philosophy of education within the German-speaking world.

Bibliography

Bergman MM, Hupka-Brunner S, Meyer T, et al. (eds) (2012) Education – Work – Coming of Age: An Interdisciplinary Perspective on the Transition in Adolescence and Early Adulthood. Wiesbaden: Springer VS.

Bremer H and Lange-Vester A (eds) (2022) Developments in the Field of Higher Education: Fundamental Perspectives, Governance, Transitions, and Inequalities. Weinheim, Basel: Beltz Juventa.

Bülow-Schramm M & Krempkow R (2014) A Critical View from Within. The Future of Higher Education Research Under Scrutiny. Die Hochschule 1/2014, 50–63.

Felt U and Fochler M (2024) Quality Assessment in Appointment Processes at Higher Education Institutions in Austria: An Analytical Review of Practices, Perspectives, and Challenges. Study commissioned by the Universities Conference.

Freitag WK, Kerst C, and Ordemann J (2022) Editorial: Higher Education Access and Study Among Non-Traditional Students: The Situation in Austria, Germany, and Switzerland. Journal of Higher Education Development (ZFHE) 17(4): 9–21.

Geier I, Hummer R, Milz S, et al. (2026) Transformative learning in the higher education context. Journal of Higher Education Development 21(1).

Gruschka, A. (2013) Education–Competence. In: Asdonk, J., Kuhnen, S., Bornkessel, P. (Eds.): From School to University. Analyses, Concepts, and Design Perspectives on the Transition. Münster et al.: Waxmann (2013), pp. 77–86.

Hagenauer G, Ittner D, Suter R, et al. (2018) Editorial: Evidence-Based Quality Development in Higher Education Teaching: Opportunities, Challenges, and Limits. Journal of Higher Education Development (ZFHE) 13(1): 9–24.

Huber L. (2019) “Education through Science” as a Quality of Higher Education. Das Hochschulwesen 67(6), 154–159.

Hüther O and Krücken G (2016) Higher Education Institutions: Issues, Findings, and Perspectives in Social Science Research on Higher Education. Wiesbaden: Springer VS.

Kraler C, Schreiner C, Berger F, et al. (eds) (2025) Education and Socialization: Further Perspectives on the Work of Helmut Fend. Bad Heilbrunn: Julius Klinkhardt Publishers.

Krempkow R, Geppert C and Wilhelm E (2025) Editorial: Shaping Profiles and Opening Pathways. Academic Careers Between Structure and Self-Direction. Journal of Higher Education Development 20(2): 9–14.

Krempkow R, Vettori O, and Buß I (2021) Editorial: Accessibility and Academic Success—Between Concepts, Analyses, and Governance Practices. Journal of Higher Education Development (ZFHE) 16(4): 9–24.

Lessky F (2024) First-in-Family students’ roots and routes into higher education: Familial dynamics as drivers for breaking intergenerational cycles of educational attainment. European Educational Research Journal. DOI: 10.1177/14749041241310058.

Nairz-Wirth E and Feldmann K (2018) A relational perspective on higher education institutions. In: AQ Austria (ed) Accessibility in Higher Education: Vienna: Facultas, pp. 79–94.

Nairz-Wirth E and Feldmann K (2019) Transition and Education. In: Niederer E and Jäger N (eds) Educational Disadvantage: Positions, Contexts, and Perspectives. Innsbruck: Studienverlag, pp. 100–114.

Pasternack P, Reinmann G, Schneijderberg C, et al. (eds) (2025) Higher Education Research: Research on Higher Education and Science. Baden-Baden: Nomos.

Schäfer G (2023) What is higher education to contemporary students in Germany? Higher Education Quarterly. DOI: 10.1111/hequ.12464.

Scheid C, Münthe P, Groder M, et al. (2025) Tracing Educational Processes. What Contribution Can Educational Science Make to Higher Education Research? Call for Papers. Conference on November 21 and 22, 2025.

Schiffecker S, Lessky F, and Geppert C (2026) Gender Dimensions of Precarity in the Academic Job Market - A Comparative View of the United States and Austria. In: McNaughtan J and Wiseman AW (eds) The Emerald Handbook on International Higher Education: Navigating Workforce and Leadership Changes in a Digital Age. Leeds: Emerald Publishing Limited, pp. 179–202.

Tight M (2013) Discipline and methodology in higher education research. Higher Education Research & Development 32(1): 136–151.

Tupan-Wenno M, Camilleri AF, Fröhlich M, et al. (2016) Effective Approaches to Enhancing the Social Dimension of Higher Education.

Välimaa J (1998) Culture and Identity in Higher Education Research. Higher Education 36(2): 119–138.

Volk B, Barth P, Lehner M, et al. (2025) Editorial: Teaching Competencies for Contemporary Higher Education. Journal of Higher Education Development 20(3).

About the Journal

The ZFHE is a peer-reviewed online journal for scholarly articles with practical relevance to current issues in higher education development. The focus is on didactic, structural, and cultural developments in teaching and student learning. Particular attention is given to topics that are innovative and for which design options remain open.

The ZFHE is published by a consortium of European scholars. Further information: https://www.zfhe.at.

Submission Guidelines

Articles may be submitted in three different formats in German or English:

A research article should meet the following criteria:

  • addresses a systematic question within trans-, inter-, or intra-disciplinary contexts;
  • takes a research gap as its starting point;
  • demonstrates extensive engagement with the scholarly discourse;
  • employs a robust methodological approach;
  • includes a reflection on the author’s own work;
  • presents the research methodology;
  • employs a method that is well-suited to answering the research question;
  • presents the scholarly discourse in a reflective manner;
  • offers clearly recognizable added value or a contribution to answering the research question or to the research discussion;
  • consistently follows relevant citation rules (APA 7 style, current edition);
  • is between 20,000 and 33,000 characters in length (including spaces, as well as the title page, bibliography, and author information).

A research-guided development contribution should meet the following criteria:

  • offers a higher education development perspective with a solid research foundation;
  • discusses and analyzes a systematic problem in teaching development
  • is a scientifically grounded “institutional research” contribution
  • is supported by a literature review;
  • clearly addresses the communication between academia and practice and/or the connection between the two poles of “research and development”;
  • consistently follows relevant citation rules (APA 7 style, current edition);
  • comprises between 20,000 and 33,000 characters (including spaces, as well as the title page; bibliography and author information).

A development article should meet the following criteria:

addresses a specific issue in university development at the author’s own institution;

  • practical need;
  • is embedded in the academic discussion and literature (without, however, claiming to provide a comprehensive literature review);
  • offers suggestions for teaching and higher education development, including recommendations for action where appropriate;
  • follows a systematic and transparent structure (e.g., no obscure references to specifics and details in a practical field);
  • identifies generalizable aspects and factors in the sense of theory formation;
  • clear considerations regarding transferability;
  • Research gaps are identified
  • consistently follows relevant citation guidelines (APA 7 style, current edition);
  • is between 20,000 and 33,000 characters in length (including spaces, as well as the title page, bibliography, and author information).

Schedule

September 2026 – Deadline for submission of the complete manuscript: Please upload your manuscripts to the ZFHE journal system (https://www.zfhe.at) under the appropriate category (Research Article, Research-Guided Development Article, Development Article) for Vol. 22/1 in 2027 in anonymized form; To do so, you must first register as an “Author” in the system.

November 2026 – Feedback/Reviews: All contributions will be evaluated using a double-blind review process (see below).

January 2027 – Revision Deadline: If necessary, authors may revise their contributions by this date in response to the critiques and recommendations from the reviews.

March 2027 – Publication: In September/October 2027, the finalized contributions will be published at https://www.zfhe.at and will also be available as a print publication.

Review Process

All submitted contributions will be evaluated for their scientific quality in a “double-blind” peer-review process. The editors of an issue propose the reviewers for the respective thematic focus and assign the individual contributions to the reviewers; they also decide on the acceptance of the contributions. The selection of reviewers and the review process are overseen by a member of the Editorial Board for each thematic issue.

Formatting and Submission

To save valuable time when formatting submissions, we ask all authors to use the template available for download on the ZFHE homepage from the very beginning:

ZFHE Template German

ZFHE Template English

Texts must be editable and available in formats such as Microsoft Word (.doc), Office Open XML (.docx), Open Document Text (.odt), or plain text (.txt); please do not submit PDF files. Contributions are initially required in an anonymized version to ensure the double-blind review process. To do this, please remove all references to the authors from the document (including in the document properties!). After a positive review result, this information will be reinserted.

Any questions?

For questions regarding content, please contact:

Claudia Scheid (claudia.scheid@uibk.ac.at) and Michaela Groder (michaela.groder@uibk.ac.at).

For formal and organizational questions, please contact:

Alessandro Barberi (alessandro.barberi@zfhe.at)

We look forward to your submission!

Claudia Scheid, Peter Münte, Michaela Groder, and Franziska Lessky