The Maternity Protection Act aims to ensure safety during pregnancy and while nursing. Freie Universität Berlin takes its responsibility to support employees during this time very seriously. We aim to safeguard the health of both the pregnant person and the baby as well as to promote the interests of those who are pregnant or nursing and to ensure that they are not disadvantaged in their career progression.

In accordance with the implementation of the Maternity Protection Act, Freie Universität Berlin conducts a safety inspection of the pregnant/nursing researcher’s workplace. Safety measures might be necessary for researchers working in laboratories in particular. Such measures can include reassigning job duties or issuing an order to prohibit the pregnant/nursing researcher from working (in part or in full). In addition to work interruptions due to the maternity protection period (before and after childbirth), these measures can limit the researcher's ability to pursue their professional activities.

It is especially important for early-career researchers to be able to continue to participate in academic developments despite having reassigned or reduced duties. Otherwise, they risk facing disadvantage in the medium term.

Freie Universität is running a pilot program to support researchers to continue their scientific work in labs during their pregnancy and nursing periods. The support also extends to their return to work after the maternity protection period and parental leave. The program provides special funding to cover material or personnel costs, for example for student assistants or to fund additional hours for current part-time employees (researchers and technical assistants) to ensure that projects and tasks can continue (e.g. experiments).

The pilot phase will run until June 30^th, 2023. Funds are available exclusively to researchers in the Department of Biology, Chemistry, Pharmacy, the Department of Physics and the Department of Veterinary Medicine.

In order to apply, please fill out the application form, which must then be approved and signed by the department’s administration. The department administration submits the application to the office of the Executive Vice President (VP1).

Applications are processed on a first-come, first-served basis and can be submitted at any time during the pilot period. The awarded funds must, however, be used by June 30, 2032.

At the end of the funding period, the recipient is required to submit a brief one-page report documenting how the funds were spent.

Any questions regarding the application process can be directed to the office of the Executive Vice President,

vp1@fu-berlin.de, Tel. (030) 838 73111.

 

The program is funded as part of the German federal and state governments’ Women Professors Program III (BMBF) and with the university’s own funds.