In October 2009, Boerse Stuttgart, Germany's leading stock exchange for private investors, in conjunction with comdirect bank founded the Stiftung Rechnen foundation, based in Hamburg. It has been recognised as a legally independent civil law foundation by the responsible authorities. Its aims are to promote education, science and research in the field of numerical skills and mathematics. The foundation also supports non-profit institutions and educational establishments by procuring and passing on subsidies. With the Stiftung Rechnen foundation Boerse Stuttgart, as one of its founders, has consistently expanded its activities within the framework of its educational initiative. In order to increase pupils' knowledge of financial products, Boerse Stuttgart entered into a cooperation with the Baden-Wuerttemberg Ministry for Nutrition and Rural Areas and for Culture, Youth and Sport at the beginning of the year. Boerse Stuttgart provides pupils with teaching materials about everything to do with investment and on topics concerning the stock exchange.
"As a scientist, I am particularly interested in promoting mathematics. So the Stiftung Rechnen foundation is something that I find very important. Good, sound numerical skills should be as self-evident as reading skills. They are the basis for successful financial planning. Only the numerate can really understand financial products and the capital markets. With the Stiftung Rechnen foundation we have created a central port of call for all who make efforts to support the development of numerical skills," said Christoph Lammersdorf, CEO of Boerse Stuttgart AG.
With the legally independent civil law foundation, its founders, comdirect bank and Boerse Stuttgart, have established a central port of call for further partners from the fields of science, industry, politics and society. Under its umbrella companies and organisations can become involved in the same way as individuals. The first partners and sponsors are the PwC Foundation, the society for social research and statistical analysis forsa, the Ernst Klett publishing house, Münster University's Mathe-Meister project, the Scout24 Group and the bettermarks online learning system.
The Board of Trustees of the Stiftung Rechnen foundation comprises leading figures from science and industry: Prof. Günter M. Ziegler, who until 2008 was the President of the German Mathematicians' Association (DMV) and the driving force behind the Year of Mathematics 2008, Prof. Dr. Martin Stein from the Institute for Didactics, Mathematics and Computer Science at Münster University, Christoph Lammersdorf, CEO of Boerse Stuttgart AG, Dr. Martin Enderle, CEO of the Scout24 Group and Dr. Christian Diekmann, CFO of comdirect bank AG.