Isabel Steinhardt

Prof. Dr. Isabel Steinhardt serves as Professor of Educational Sociology at Paderborn University within the Faculty of Arts and Humanities, Department of Sociology. She leads the Bildungssoziologie (Educational Sociology) subject area and maintains an active research and teaching profile focused on critical issues in contemporary education.

Her research interests span social inequality, intersectionality, Digital Divide phenomena, digitalization, digitality, and artificial intelligence in educational contexts, alongside quality management in higher education and knowledge transfer processes. She specializes in qualitative research methods and maintains a methodological blog at https://sozmethode.hypotheses.org.

Her recent presentations and research projects reveal a strong focus on the intersection of AI and education, digital inequality in academic settings, and the sociological dimensions of university teaching practices. She has been actively involved in multiple research projects including PRAKTIK (AI applications in university teaching), Digital Divide among students through AI, and WiaQM (Knowledge transfer in quality management).

She holds significant organizational roles including organizing the 2026 conference of the Society for Higher Education Research (GfHf) and serving on the Quality Commission of the Faculty of Cultural Sciences at Paderborn University since 2024.

Her teaching portfolio includes courses on socialization through digital technologies, fundamentals of sociology, introduction to empirical social research methods, and educational sociology. She emphasizes diversity-sensitive teaching approaches and student-centered learning environments.

• Member of the Working Group on University Strategies in Times of Demographic Change of the German Science Council (2024-2026)
• Member of the Quality Commission of the Faculty of Cultural Sciences (since 2024)
• Member of the Board of Trustees for University Didactics in Saxony (since 2023)
• Spokesperson for Sociology at Paderborn University (since 2021)
• Speaker of the Working Group 'Sociological (Digital) Teaching' of the German Sociological Association (since 09/2020)