Apply today to receive a 2000 € Early-Bird Discount
June 17, 2021

Our Learning Philosophy

Thomas Funke

In today’s fast-paced world, life-long learning has become a necessary and ongoing task. Technological innovations require us to update our competencies in ever faster intervals. Learning how to learn continuously, how to update your skills and align them with your prior knowledge, is the key to future success. This is a shift from skills to competencies, from learning knowledge to applying knowledge, and from career being outside of learning, to having it nested in relationships and network. This shift means we need to teach for the lifelong learner, and to adapt the learning journey accordingly.

A completely new learning journey in higher education


We shift higher education from this -- > to this

At Tomorrow’s Education, we employ an innovative learning approach to prepare you for the future. Our program is based on best practice in learning science and technology, designed so you can make an impact. This starts by identifying your purpose, study goals and impact areas. Using these to guide your learning journey provides the motivation and focus needed to achieve impact

Competency-Based Learning 


Tomorrow is the place to acquire the competencies for the 21st century. We have developed an extensive competency framework (75 skills) based on research by the World Economic Forum and OECD to equip our students with essential 21st century capabilities including initiative, persistence/grit, adaptability, curiosity, leadership as well as social and cultural awareness. At the centre of this framework is the mindset of limitless growth, one of our core values.

Every student has a learning dashboard: A digital decision support system and progress tracker. Students are tasked with revisiting their target profile regularly. They receive constant feedback by our renowned mentors. The dashboard is set up for life-long learning. You can come back to it whenever you  are ready to continue your learning journey. 

Our 75 skill Competency Framework

Collaborative Challenge-Based Approach 

We want you to gain the relevant competencies to tackle the big challenges ahead. That’s why we structured our learning around challenges, not around courses. Challenges refer to topics like climate change, responsible consumption and production or public health threats, just to name a few. When faced with a challenge, you leverage your experience, harness internal and external resources, develop a plan and push forward to find the best solution. The result is urgency, passion, and ownership. Challenges are developed with partners from our community to make the content and data sets relevant. To get you on the right path, we blend academic content with the competencies that employers are looking for. It is predestined for group work, and at Tomorrow’s Education, we provide you with an outstanding group of peers and mentors who help you every step of the way .

Paced and Individualized Education 

All our programs are delivered online and available 24/7 from anywhere in the world, making them accessible and flexible. This is ideal for students who learn while working. Students move through phases of learning based on their individual readiness, allowing them to transform at their own pace. The four distinct phases of all programs are: Orientation, Calibration, Elevation, and Activation. Students can cycle through these phases multiple times. Paced and individualized education is designed to promote academic exploration and then push rigor within disciplines. Instead of grades, we use a rubric which is applied by reviewers who are experts in the respective disciplines. 

Want to learn more ? Download our Learning Approach



DISCOVER OUR LEARNING PHILOSOPHYBack To Blog

About Thomas

Thomas is Co-Founder & Chief Academic Officer of Tomorrow’s Education. In his professional career, Funke has always been passionate about education and entrepreneurship, with more than 15 years of professional experience in the education sector. As a lecturer, his key areas are entrepreneurship and innovation at the Goethe University Frankfurt as well as the WU Executive Academy of the Vienna University of Economics and Business (WU Wien). In 2016, Funke founded the Frankfurt-based TechQuartier – a startup hub, coworking space and community place. Since then he has accompanied aspiring startups on their path to success. He is part of the digital advisory board of the Eintracht Frankfurt soccer club as well as the advisory board of iamstudent.eu. He studied International Business and completed his PhD in Entrepreneurship at the Vienna University of Economics and Business.

Outside fo work, Thomas loves sports and nature - because it helps him relax and silence his zest for action; he loves reading and exploring new topics - currently physics, space travel and machine learning, and spending time with his family and four children - seeing the world from their eyes.