Germany's schools are running out of teachers
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Loading... - Sabrina Jabal
- 09 Feb 2023
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Germany is facing a major challenge to its education system — it needs tens of thousands more teachers. Hiring from abroad is one of the bright ideas to fill the gaps, but bureaucracy is hindering efforts.
In prosperous Germany, school buildings are in disrepair. Plaster is crumbling off the walls, toilets are broken and gymnasiums are closed for repair work. Many don't have Wi-Fi and computers are scarce. Teachers are exhausted, and more and more students are at risk of being left behind after schools were closed for weeks during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The sorry state of Germany's education system is the result of mismanagement and poor planning, say education researchers, and it comes at a time when schools face new challenges as they are expected to help with the integration of more foreign students.
A majority of school administrators say the shortage of teachers is the biggest challenge, according to the latest German school barometer
published this week by the Robert Bosch Foundation.
"We believe there are 30,000 to 40,000 teaching positions that are not filled," Dagmar Wolf, an education researcher at the Robert Bosch Foundation, told DW.
Education policy is the remit of Germany's 16 state governments, whose conference of education ministers has put the number of unfilled teaching positions at a much lower 12,000. But the German Teachers' Association said those figures have been embellished by the fact that some schools list parents and other helpers as teachers in the statistics.
Most dramatic teacher shortage in decades
"The alarm bells have been ringing for a long time. However, I don't recall such drama and severity as we are experiencing now," Heinz-Peter Meidinger, president of the German Teachers' Association, told DW.
He sees several reasons for the current situation. Despite increases in the birth rate, the number of teacher trainee positions has been massively reduced over the last 20 to 30 years, and job security for young teachers is no longer a given. Read More…
