The Family-Friendly University Service Centre

We think of a “family” as a partnership or a community made up of different generations - parents, children, siblings and grandparents. The characteristic feature of this community is that its members take responsibility for each other. Students and university staff should be able to have a career and a family as well, and so Esslingen University of Applied Sciences provides family-friendly conditions for those who study and those who work here.
In June 2020, Esslingen University of Applied Sciences was awarded the berufundfamilie Service GmbH certificate for the 5th time in a row and now has permanent certification.
General Information
Offers and measures
What we already offer
To supplement the advice provided by the service centre, Esslingen University of Applied Sciences offers a variety of activities to help members of the university reconcile their work and their family life:
Family-friendly working
- Confidential information and advice on family- related issues
- Working hours regulations which take the demands of the family into account
(Flexible working hours regulations, alternating periods of working from home, options to take leave) - Free psychological counselling for staff who are experiencing a family crisis or stressful situation
- Family member requires nursing care: free staff hotline with specialist advisory services and practical help
- Initial advice from a colleague should a family member require (emergency) nursing care (buddies for carers (Pflegelotsen) project)
- Parents pack (Elternmappe) and nursing care pack (Pflegemappe) - collection of information in the intranet
- Academic appointments - Senate resolution to pay due regard to family-related breaks in a professional biography
Family-friendly studying
- Child-care centre run by the Student Services Organisation on the Flandernstrasse campus
- Taking account of the demands made by family life in the organisation of the programme requirements and in the regulations governing degree programmes and examinations
- Advice on studying with a family from the Student Advice Centre
- Leaflet “Studying with children”
Further services
- Talks and information events on family-related topics
- Baby care rooms
- Mobile toy boxes
More information on all the measures available can be obtained from the Family-Friendly University Service Centre) and from the intranet.
goals and certificate
Family-friendly working and studying
Esslingen University of Applied Sciences regularly sets itself new objectives to improve its level of family friendliness and works constantly on their implementation. Its aim is to improve the satisfaction of staff and students alike with the opportunities provided to reconcile family responsibilities with studying and working. Esslingen University of Applied Sciences strives to be an attractive employer and educational provider for both new members of staff and prospective students.
It is supported in this endeavour by the workandfamily agency (audit berufundfamilie), and is monitored and certified by the family-friendly university audit. Esslingen University of Applied Sciences has been recognised as a family-friendly university since 2006. It has meanwhile undergone four re-audits, in 2009, 2012, 2016 and 2019. Its most recent achievement was to be awarded the certificate in the family-friendly university audit for a further three years in 2019. Our objectives for the next certification period are outlined in this Brief Portrait.