Prof. Dr. Claudia de Witt

Vice-President for Teaching, Studies and Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Educational Processes

Photo: FernUniversität
Prof. Dr. Claudia de Witt

Prof. Dr. Claudia de Witt has been a professor of Educational Theory and Media Education at the Institute for Educational Science and Media Research in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at the FernUniversität in Hagen since October 2004. She comes from an academic background in educational sciences, sociology, and psychology, which she studied at the University of Dortmund. She received her doctorate from the same university in 1992 with a dissertation on the interactivity of multimedia learning programs. She followed this up with a post-doctoral thesis on "New Media and the Pedagogy of Pragmatism" in 2001. From 2001 to 2004, she worked as a lecturer in the field of media didactics and knowledge management at the University of Duisburg.

She currently teaches and researches in the field of education and digitalization, with a particular focus on the didactic design of teaching and learning processes using innovative educational technologies. A central aspect of her work is the implementation of these technologies – especially artificial intelligence (AI) – in higher education. Her research interests include the use of value-based formative feedback supported by AI, the development of competencies through extended reality (XR) technologies, and digital tools that promote self-regulated learning in distance education.

At the FernUniversität, she was a member of the Senate from 2016 to 2022, Vice Dean of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences from 2014 to 2025, and has participated in numerous other committees and commissions of academic self-government. She is currently a member of the management board of the CATALPA Research Center.

Since 2025, Claudia de Witt has also been a member of the task force AI in Higher Education that is sponsored by the Stifterverband für die Deutsche Wissenschaft (Association of the Friends of the German Sciences) and is actively involved in the AI ​​Campus project. She played a key role in founding the Media Pedagogy Working Group of the German Society for Educational Science (DGfE) in 1994. From 2000 to 2004, she chaired the DGfE’s Section for Media and Environmental Education. In addition, she serves on advisory boards and acts as a reviewer for numerous academic organizations and publications.

Since 1 April 2025, she has been the Vice-President for Teaching, Studies, and Artificial Intelligence in Educational Processes at the FernUniversität.

Contact:

Email: claudia.dewitt
Phone: +49 2331 987 4491
Address: Universitätsstraße 33, 58097 Hagen

Dr. Nicolas Brauer

Personal Assistant to the Vice-President

Email: nicolas.brauer