Gütersloh, 09/03/2019

Bertelsmann Opens Applications For New Digital Scholarship Initiative

Bertelsmann is awarding 50,000 Udacity scholarships for online courses in the fields of cloud, data, and artificial intelligence. The top graduates will receive a further scholarship for one of three of the online learning platform’s nanodegree programs. The first application phase begins today and runs until November 6.

Bertelsmann is campaigning for the acquisition of tech skills: Interested parties worldwide are now invited to apply for one of 15,000 Udacity scholarships for a three-and-a-half-month online course in the fields of Cloud, Data, or Artificial Intelligence. The top graduates will receive a further scholarship for one of three nanodegree programs on the digital continuing education platform.

The scholarships are the first stage of a global initiative by the international media, services, and education group. Over the next three years, Bertelsmann will devote several million euros to funding around 50,000 tech scholarships in the fields of Cloud, Data, and Artificial Intelligence. The offer aims to provide employees with the necessary digital skills for the labor market of the future.

Thomas Rabe says: “Bertelsmann has set itself the goal of becoming a technologically leading media, services, and education company. We are particularly looking at opportunities in the fields of Cloud, Data, and Artificial Intelligence. We feel it is our responsibility to empower as many people as possible to be successful in the digital world, and to support policymakers in this. The continuing-education initiatives that we carried out in cooperation with Udacity and Google in the past met with great interest – which is why we are awarding more scholarships than ever before over the next three years: around 50,000.”

There are high hopes that as many applicants as possible will be Bertelsmann employees, as Thomas Rabe explains in a letter today. Immanuel Hermreck, CHRO, adds: “Training our employees was and remains essential for Bertelsmann. We see it as our duty to optimally prepare our employees for the demanding digital and technical tasks of tomorrow’s working world. Well-trained employees are a crucial factor in implementing our business strategy.”

Regarding the new Udacity Technology Scholarship Program, Hermreck adds: “In the last Udacity Data Science scholarship initiative, 22 percent of the graduates were Bertelsmann employees. This shows that basic tech skills are already seen as essential not only from the company’s point of view, but also from that of the employees. We are therefore pleased to be able to offer our employees an even more comprehensive educational initiative for effectively building their tech skills with the Udacity Technology Scholarship Program. I would like to encourage colleagues in our company to seize this great opportunity and submit an application.”

In recent years, Bertelsmann had already awarded several thousand Udacity scholarships as part of a cooperation with Google. The EU Commission honored the joint continuing training initiative with its “EU Digital Skills Award.”

Udacity is a learning platform that develops practical online courses in collaboration with leading tech companies. It is headquartered in Mountain View, California. Bertelsmann is one of the company’s largest shareholders.

Applications for a Bertelsmann scholarship at Udacity are now being accepted online at www.udacity.com/bertelsmann-tech-scholarships  (recommended browser: Google Chrome or Firefox) until November 6, 2019. Applicants must focus on one of three subject areas:

• Cloud, i.e. applications for online-based IT infrastructures
• Data, i.e. applications for the analysis and interpretation of large volumes of data
• Artificial Intelligence, i.e. applications related to machine learning and intelligent algorithms

The scholarship recipients will be selected in November 2019 and will begin the Challenge Course in the same month. Depending on the individual’s pre-existing knowledge, between three and five hours a week should be planned for this over three-and-a-half-month period. The scholarships are aimed at both beginners (basic computer skills are recommended) and experienced programmers.

The top students from the first phase of the scholarship program will then receive another scholarship for a full Udacity nanodegree program: Cloud DevOps Engineer, Data Analyst, or Deep Learning.