At least Annette Schavan has remained true to herself. As Christian Democratic Minister of Education, she introduced eight-year high schools (G8) in Baden-Württemberg in 2004. When she read that the G8 had failed, the future Federal Minister of Education told the Baden-Württemberg weekly newspaper Government Gazette, she had to smile. Although a significantly higher proportion of the school year graduates today than before, the average grade for the Abitur has improved. “The G8 doesn’t look unattractive.”
But the eight-year-old high school no longer has many supporters in Baden-Württemberg. Last year, a parents’ initiative collected over 100,000 signatures for a return to nine-year high school, forcing the green-black state government to take action. This week, Education Minister Theresa Schopper (Greens) announced in the state parliament that the federal state would definitely reintroduce G9 as a standard form from the 2025/26 school year. Starting with grade five. So it will take some time before another G9 class in the southwest graduates from high school.
20 years ago, the G8 was booming
The reform will start before the state elections in 2026. The Green Prime Minister Winfried Kretschmann makes no secret of the fact that he would have liked to stick to the eight-year high school because he considers other reforms in the education system to be more important. However, his party had to fear that the CDU, SPD and FDP would then make the popular G9 demand an election campaign issue.
With Schopper’s announcement, Baden-Württemberg is completing a reversal that has already been completed or at least initiated in the other western German states: Lower Saxony, for example, has long since implemented the abandonment of the previous Abitur, while North Rhine-Westphalia and Schleswig-Holstein have been on the way there for several years. In Bavaria, the last G8 class is currently graduating from high school. Only the city states of Hamburg and Bremen and the eastern German states stick with the Abitur after eight years of high school.
The so-called Turbo-Abi was booming nationwide 20 years ago. According to a popular theory at the time, the G8 would make Germany more internationally competitive. The economy should be able to rely on younger people starting their careers, and a longer working life should relieve the burden on pension funds. In practice, however, the criticism soon outweighed the criticism: overloaded curricula, according to the lawsuit, led to stress among students.
Yes to the reform of the reform, but not “at a pig’s gallop”
The pressure to reform is now putting politicians under stress. This will be “not an easy number,” said Schopper in the state parliament. Kretschmann, once a teacher himself, emphasized again this week that the return to nine-year high school should not be viewed in isolation. In the past few weeks, the government leadership has tried to familiarize the people of Baden-Württemberg with the somewhat unwieldy technical term “student electricity management”. The students are already flocking to high school, with over 40 percent of a year graduating from high school. Kretschmann fears that the return to the G9 will create an additional pull that the high schools are not prepared for. Neither space nor personnel.
The state government therefore wants, on the one hand, to make the recommendation of the primary school for a secondary school type more binding, and on the other hand to keep the other types of schools attractive. Quite a big undertaking with not so full coffers. The G9 reform alone will cost a higher three-digit million amount per year in the medium term.
A concrete concept is not yet available. The Greens and CDU are still wrestling with details such as the question of the extent to which students should continue to have the opportunity to graduate from high school after just eight years. You won’t make the same mistake as 20 years ago and push through the reform “at a gallop,” said Schopper.