Studierende sitzen in der Wiese vor dem D4

Courses and academic matters

Available course list (winter semester 2024)

A list of courses that are still available in winter semester 2024 and haven't started yet can be found here.

Note: This is a preliminary list of available courses. While we update the list regularly, availability of courses can still change minute-by-minute. Therefore, we cannot guarantee spots in particular courses.
 

Course deregistration

Please find the form to deregister from courses in winter semester 2024 here.

Courses for incoming students

You can find all courses available to incoming exchange students in our “Course Catalog", including the course descriptions.

The winter semester (October–January) course list is available at the beginning of July; the course list for the summer semester (March–June) is published in late December or early January. You can find the academic calender as well as dates and deadlines here.

For orientation purposes, you can view the courses that were offered in previous semesters, but please note that not all courses are offered every semester. You will be able to check the availability of courses prior to registration.

Course numbers have a purely administrative purpose and change every semester.

Information for distance learning students (e.g. ENGAGE.EU, ECOL): The information regarding the course catalog and course registration on this website might not be relevant for you.

Course registration

Course registration for incoming exchange students starts on one specific day for all courses, about 6 weeks before the semester starts. 

The registration period for the summer semester 2025 starts on January 22, 2025 at 14:00 / 2pm, Vienna time, and ends on January 26, 2025. The registration dates indicated in the syllabi are not valid for incoming exchange students.

To register for courses, please use the LPIS system. You can find more information about LPIS and how to log in here. Course registration takes place on a first-come, first-served basis and some courses can fill up within seconds. You should have several courses to fall back on if your first choices are full. Be sure to continuously check LPIS during the registration period since spots may become available again. For courses that are currently full, you may apply for a waiting list. You will receive an email from WU’s Incoming Team with instructions about the waiting list process and when will it will become available.

It is your responsibility to avoid time conflicts with other courses. Our online registration system LPIS does not prevent you from registering for conflicting courses. Please check your schedule for overlaps before the registration. Attendance in the first and last session of a course is absolutely mandatory.You can also use the LV-Planer, which is provided by ÖH. It is a very useful tool where you can add all of your desired courses and see if there are any overlaps. In the end you can also download the calender with all of your courses and add it to your calender on your phone or notebook. In order to get access to the tool, you need to create an account.

After the end of the registration period, the Incoming Team can still register you for courses if spots are available. Please contact incoming@wu.ac.at in such cases. You can only be registered or deregistered for courses that have not started yet. Please always indicate your WU student ID number as well as the course number.

Courses on master’s level are not available to bachelor’s students and vice versa.

Video Course registration

Course registration

Tutorial on course registration

Attendance

Attendance is mandatory in all sessions. Please check the scheduled dates of all your courses carefully to avoid course time conflicts. If it is not possible to avoid minor time conflicts, please refer to the syllabus for the attendance requirements of the respective courses. As a last resort, contact the instructors concerned before the start of the courses (but after course registration) and ask if and for how long you may be absent from a course. Please note that attendance of the first and last session is absolutely mandatory.

Attending courses without registration is not possible and it is not possible to “try out” courses. Please also refrain from attending the first session of a course without being registered for it.

Grading

The Austrian grading system applies at WU. These are the grades used:

1sehr gut/excellent
2gut/good
3befriedigend/satisfactory
4genügend/sufficient
5nicht genügend/fail

WU does not use a standardized percentage-based grading scale. The percentage scores needed to earn the grades given above differ from course to course. In most cases, the course-specific grading scales can be found in the online course description.

Language requirements

The English and German-taught courses deal with topics at an advanced academic level, and students must therefore have a good command of English or German to be able to follow the courses and participate in group discussions.

Depending on the language of instruction (English or German), we recommend that incoming bachelor’s students should at least have language skills at B2 level (according to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages, CEFR) in English or German. Incoming master’s students must have a level equivalent to C1 of the CEFR.

WU does not require official language certificates. However, if students do not meet the language requirements, we reserve the right to de-register them from courses.

Academic life

University life in Austria may be different from your home university. Part of your exchange experience will be adapting to your new environment at WU. Please consider the following aspects:

  • Academic life in Austria is rather formal, e.g. we address a professor with “Dear professor XY” and try to be very polite with students, lecturers, and staff.

  • At WU, most courses are taught in a seminar-like format and require active participation and group work.

  • Students need to create their own schedule and are expected to register only for courses that don’t overlap. It is also the students’ responsibility to make sure they fulfill the prerequisites.

  • Students are expected to do pre-course readings and hand in pre-course assignments in time. They should get familiar with WU’s learning and information portal LEARN and are expected to check their WU email address on a regular basis.

Have a look at WU's code of conduct we@wu to get a better understanding of what WU expects from you and what you can expect from WU.

Plagiarism

We are committed to academic integrity, honesty, and fairness, and we expect students to comply with our rules and regulations. This means that any form of “foul play” (e.g. plagiarism) is considered a serious offense and your home university will be informed. Please ask your course instructor about the rules for citations and references in any kind of written paper (e.g. essay, report, homework) you have to submit. Further information on plagiarism can be found here.

Learn more!

Course Catalog