topic Education

Innovation in Education

Our school system must enable more children and young people to earn higher education qualifications. This includes a higher level of performance as well as more social skills. In schools, the strengths and individual abilities and background of each child must be given focus. It is essential that individual strengths are supported and individual disadvantages are overcome.

National and international school benchmarking studies have revealed several central deficits in the German education system. Although many measures have been taken in the recent years, particularly in regards to supporting socially disadvantaged children, there is still a considerable need for action. This must be the starting point for further reforms in order to enable equal opportunity throughout the entire educational path and beyond.

In international school benchmarking studies PRILS/IGLU and PISA, German pupils have improved over the recent years. The PIRLS/IGLU Study 2006 gives German primary education a good report card: between 2001 and 2006, reading has improved, with higher numbers of strong readers. However, there is still a strong correlation between social background and success in school.

For the first time, PISA 2009 placed German pupils in the top third of OECD countries in the areas of mathematics and natural sciences. For reading competence, Germany was in the OECD midrange. Both stronger and weaker pupils showed positive development since PISA 2000. Young people with migration backgrounds scored significantly better in reading compared to PISA 2000. The correlation between reading skills and social background has also decreased since PISA 2000. In comparison to other countries, however, this correlation is still high.

The results of the PIRLS/IGLU Study 2006 and the PISA Study 2009 support the importance of the fields of actions negotiated by the Kultusministerkonferenz (KMK) in 2001. The Federal Government and the Länder will continue to work diligently.

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  topic Education

  All-day schools - The investment programme "The Future of Education and Care"

  The all-day school programme is one of the largest federal and state initiatives in the area of education. The Federal Government supports the sustainable structuring of all-day schools through the programme "More ideas! All-day learning," the regional service agencies "All-Day Learning" in the individual Länder, and the concurrent research project "Study on the Development of All-Day Schools" (StEG), in which all 16 Länder participate. The Federal Government has supported the Länder in their development and expansion of over 8,200 all-day schooling through the investment programme "The Future of Education and Care" (IZBB) from 2003 to 2009. In the meantime, 51.1 per cent of the country's general schools at the primary and lower secondary levels offer all-day school programmes.
   read more: All-day schools - The investment programme "The Future of Education and Care"
  (URL: http://www.bmbf.de/en/1125.php)