Music therapy at the FHWS receives funding from the funding line "Small subjects - great potential".

Within the framework of the "Small Subject Weeks" of the German Rectors' Conference (HRK) and the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), 17 projects will receive funding for the presentation and networking of their small subjects in the next winter semester. At the Würzburg-Schweinfurt University of Applied Sciences, the Faculty of Applied Social Sciences is supporting the "Music Therapy in the Conflict of Social Challenges - A Collaborative Project on Teaching, Research and Practice" in cooperation with the SRH University of Applied Sciences Heidelberg, the Hamburg University of Music and Theatre, the Friedensau Theological University, the University of Augsburg and the Berlin University of the Arts.

"The joint initiative is intended to strengthen these subjects, which play an important but rarely appreciated role in the German higher education landscape. It aims to make the academic achievements of the small subjects more visible, to provide information about study opportunities and career prospects and to make the everyday relevance of the small subjects tangible," said HRK President Professor Dr. Peter-André Alt. The HRK and the BMBF want to interest students and young academics in the small subjects.

In the application, Professor Dr. Thomas Wosch, together with his collaborating partners, explained the relevance of music therapy: "Little is currently known about the degree programmes, the excellent quality of science and its interdisciplinary orientation, and the high potential of the practical transfer of music therapy as a small subject. The current areas of application of music therapy range from neonatology (premature babies) to geriatrics, all psychiatric diseases and neurorehabilitation, school social work, community work and work with the disabled and migration. This broad spectrum of application areas underlines the great necessity of interdisciplinary research in music therapy in cooperation with the above-mentioned disciplines. In addition, music therapy offers manifold potentials for meeting major social challenges such as demographic and digital change through the transfer of research results to the health and care system.

The BMBF has been funding small subjects for years. With the funding guideline "Small Subjects - Great Potential" published in 2016, the BMBF will enable over forty excellent young scientists from small disciplines to conduct research on projects by 2021. In order to further strengthen the interdisciplinary and international cooperation of the small disciplines, the BMBF will publish a new funding guideline this autumn.

For many years, the German Rectors' Conference has been committed to the preservation and strengthening of small disciplines. It has thus initiated their systematic mapping as an important basis for situation analysis and systematic funding (small subjects).