Stark-Watzinger – "The German education system is in a deep crisis"

Federal Education Minister Bettina Stark-Watzinger (FDP) has called for far-reaching reforms in the school and education system. She told the "Bild am Sonntag": "The German education system is in a deep crisis that affects us all." The federal, state and local governments must pull together in education. The federal government cannot always continue to give money. “We finally have to tackle the structural problems. This will only work with a new form and culture of cooperation with everyone involved. We need to set up an education team instead of pointing fingers at others.”

Representatives of politics, science and civil society will meet in Berlin on Tuesday for the "education summit", and Stark-Watzinger will also take part in the meeting. The traffic light had agreed a meeting under this title in their coalition agreement. Improvements in the education system are often made more difficult because of the different responsibilities between the federal, state and local governments. After the meeting, a new working group with representatives from all sides and additional experts will develop proposals for better cooperation.

The Minister of Education told the newspaper that “more speed” is needed, especially when it comes to digitization. “A lot of the five billion euros of the actual digital pact has already been planned, but not enough has reached the schools. This is also due to the overly bureaucratic implementation.” At the same time, Stark-Watzinger criticized the fact that many school buildings were dilapidated: “It is true that some schools in Germany are in a bad state. There are deficits not only in digitalization, but also in relation to sanitary facilities and gyms. The investment backlog must be addressed in parallel with digitization.”

Representatives of the Greens also called for better cooperation between the various levels and actors in education policy. "The education summit must set an exclamation mark and make it clear that only more successful cooperation for better education with equal opportunities will ensure Germany's future viability," said Kai Gehring, chairman of the Bundestag's education committee, the German press agency. The meeting must be the starting signal for a new culture of cooperation between federal, state and local governments with educational research and civil society.

He pointed to problems such as the shortage of teachers, learning deficits and deterioration in student performance as well as a high school drop-out rate against the background of the worsening shortage of skilled workers. All levels and actors are called upon to ensure more equal opportunities, greater permeability, quality and performance as well as opportunities for advancement, "so that we don't slide into a deep educational crisis".

Meanwhile, the head of the Ifo Center for Educational Economics, Ludger Woessmann, warned against devaluing Abitur grades. He told the "Bild am Sonntag": "We urgently need to go back to the previous grading and the previous entitlement to performance, otherwise the important signal effect of the Abitur grades will be lost." After the Corona pandemic, the Abitur and final exams should not remain at an easier level permanently.

The education policy spokeswoman for the FDP in the Bundestag, Ria Schröder, criticized the different requirements in the federal states: “Germany has 16 different school systems, curricula and examination regulations. There can be no uniform high school diploma,” Schröder told the newspaper. "We need more quality through comparability in education."

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