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TEACHING

Coronavirus: Can Germany’s schools safely reopen?

Shortly before the end of the summer holidays in some of Germany’s 16 states, many are still skeptical as to whether the planned return to regular operations in schools will work in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic.

Published: 28 July 2020 17:22 CEST
Coronavirus: Can Germany's schools safely reopen?
Photo: DPA/CosmosDirekt

This Thursday, southern Baden-Württemberg will be the last state to go on summer vacation, while in northeastern Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania the new school year is already set to begin next Monday, August 3rd.

Several other states will begin opening their doors to schools in the days and weeks that follow.

READ ALSO: Here's when summer school holidays start across Germany's 16 states

Before the summer, state education ministers agreed to resume regular operations in the schools, and also to waive the social distancing rules “provided the incidence of infection allows it”. 

In mid-July they presented a new hygiene framework to allow for the safe return of children to the classroom.

Teachers under pressure

Yet according to the German Teachers' Association, schools are not sufficiently prepared to welcome back students.

Association President Heinz-Peter Meidinger told DPA that they fear “a big mess”. 

The Federal Parents' Council expects more school closures as coronavirus cases rise, and they assume that the school year “will by no means run according to plan,” said chairman Stephan Wassmuth.

According to Meidinger, a lack of teaching staff will make it difficult for schools to fully reopen. Education trade unions estimate that up to 20 percent of teachers belong to the risk group and would not be available for in-person teaching. 

The hygiene rules for schools laid down by the education ministers have also been criticised for being impractical, for example the requirement for regular ventilation (stoßzulüften – or fully opening the windows)

“At many schools, the windows in higher classrooms cannot be opened or can only be opened slightly for safety reasons,” said Meidinger.

Sticking together

Robert Koch Institute (RKI) president, Lothar Wieler, said it was important to keep class groups together and not to mix up the classes, as they typically are at secondary schools. So-called “epidemiological units” must be formed, he said Tuesday in Berlin.

Yet Wieler said the measure would only make sense if pupils spent their free time with those from the same “unit”.

Wassmun said he expects school closures in some regions due to the pandemic and demanded concrete plans from the federal states for a “Scenario B” with a mixture of both classroom and distance learning. 

READ ALSO: State by state: When (and how) will Germany's schools reopen again?

“Those who did not prepare this are acting highly negligent and against the students.”

Teachers' Association President Meidinger also thinks it would be sensible for states to draw up lists of subject areas “whose teaching is dispensable in the next school year” as a precautionary measure. 

A pupil in Berlin in March 2019. Photo: DPA

“We have to be honest. There will not be ideal teaching conditions for a long time yet,” he said.

In order to prepare for further possible school closures, Meidinger believes that the billions in subsidies earmarked for school digitization must now be “pumped into the schools at full speed”. 

'Teaching disaster must be avoided'

Left (Die Linke) party leader Katja Kipping said on Tuesday that there was a “dramatic failure of education policy through inaction” and called for school laptops for all pupils, as well as expert working groups at the federal and state level on online teaching. 

Free Democrats (FDP) deputy faction leader Katja Suding called on school boards and states to use the remaining holiday period to ensure that face-to-face lessons could take place to the greatest possible extent after the holidays. 

“A teaching disaster like at the beginning of the coronavirus must not be allowed to happen a second time,” she said, referring to early March when schools across Germany indefinitely closed their doors – open without a plan for reopening. 

READ ALSO: All German states announce school and Kita closures

Germany's Doctors Association stressed that, in whatever way it occurs, children needed to return to to schools.

Without sufficient instruction over a longer period of time, kids are “threatened with enormous problems in their physical and mental development,” said president Klaus Reinhardt.

Key vocabulary

Summer holidays – (die) Sommerferien

Mess – (das) Durcheinander

Social distancing rules – (die) Abstandsregel

Teaching conditions – (die) Unterrichtsbedingungen

We're aiming to help our readers improve their German by translating vocabulary from some of our news stories. Did you find this article useful? Let us know.

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DISCRIMINATION

Schools in Sweden discriminate against parents with Arabic names: study

Parents with Arabic-sounding names get a less friendly response and less help when choosing schools in Sweden, according to a new study from the University of Uppsala.

Published: 6 April 2022 12:05 CEST
Schools in Sweden discriminate against parents with Arabic names: study

In one of the largest discrimination experiments ever carried out in the country, 3,430 primary schools were contacted via email by a false parent who wanted to know more about the school. The parent left information about their name and profession.

In the email, the false parent stated that they were interested in placing their child at the school, and questions were asked about the school’s profile, queue length, and how the application process worked. The parent was either low-educated (nursing assistant) or highly educated (dentist). Some parents gave Swedish names and others gave “Arabic-sounding” names.

The report’s author, Jonas Larsson Taghizadeh said that the study had demonstrated “relatively large and statistically significant negative effects” for the fictional Arabic parents. 

“Our results show that responses to emails signed with Arabic names from school principals are less friendly, are less likely to indicate that there are open slots, and are less likely to contain positive information about the school,” he told The Local. 

READ ALSO: Men with foreign names face job discrimination in Sweden: study

The email responses received by the fictional Arabic parents were rated five percent less friendly than those received by the fictional Swedish parents, schools were 3.2 percentage points less likely to tell Arabic parents that there were open slots at the school, and were 3.9 percentage points less likely to include positive information about the municipality or the school. 

There was no statistically significant difference in the response rate and number of questions answered by schools to Swedish or Arabic-sounding parents. 

Taghizadeh said that there was more discrimination against those with a low social-economic status job than against those with an Arabic name, with the worst affected group being those who combined the two. 

“For socioeconomic discrimination, the results are similar, however, here the discrimination effects are somewhat larger,” he told The Local. 

Having a high economic status profession tended to cancel out the negative effects of having an Arabic name. 

“The discrimination effects are substantially important, as they could potentially indirectly influence parents’ school choice decision,” Taghizadeh said.

“Investigating socioeconomic discrimination is also important in itself, as discrimination is seldom studied and as explicit discrimination legislation that bans class-based discrimination is rare in Western countries including Sweden, in contrast to laws against ethnic discrimination.” 

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