Bavaria: Piazolo about the Bavarian education system – Bavaria

Minister of Education Michael Piazolo (FW) has sworn the school family and the general public to take great effort to admit thousands of Ukrainian pupils to the Bavarian schools. In his opinion, this is not a matter of weeks, “but will keep us busy for a long time,” he said in the state parliament’s education committee on Thursday. It’s “all a crazy challenge”. German classes could not be scaled up at will. “At some point the forces are exhausted,” said Piazolo.

Direct words that might as well have come from teacher representatives. They had recently repeatedly warned that it was almost impossible to do justice to the thousands of new and sometimes traumatized young refugees with the existing staff. A concern that comes to a head with a view to the summer: after three months, compulsory schooling takes effect in the Free State. By then at the latest, school-age children and young people who have arrived must be accepted into the school system, which is already exhausted in many places.

More than 15,000 students are already registered at the Bavarian schools, “and the number is growing every day,” says Piazolo. 600 pedagogical welcome classes have been set up so far, which are intended to give the students structure, a warm nest and their first knowledge of German. More than 1700 teachers and welcome workers have been recruited so far, including 500 Ukrainian or Russian speakers. Which is hardly enough. At the same time, 3,000 pregnant teachers are missing because of the ban on entry used during the pandemic.

A bilingual campaign is intended to help recruit more educators

Piazolo therefore waved a blue and yellow flyer in the committee on Thursday. His house has launched a multi-channel bilingual campaign to recruit more educators. “We want and need the forces,” said Piazolo. The aim is to conclude contracts quickly. To this end, his company has removed bureaucratic hurdles such as a police clearance certificate. In addition, the appeal goes to established teachers to increase. Because of the heavy workload, many teachers only work part-time.

The question of integrating Ukrainian schoolchildren is also a political balancing act. The Ukrainian Consul General in Hamburg had warned against prematurely integrating the students. He understands the concern that the children will lose their roots and there will be a “brain drain” in the country, said Piazolo. “Who is going to rebuild Ukraine?” he asked rhetorically. However, he rejected the proposal from the SPD parliamentary group to firmly establish Ukrainian in schools. “Then the Turkish ambassador will be there very quickly and ask: why don’t we do Turkish?” he said.

The situation is further exacerbated by the images in their heads that many children bring to Bavaria. Some paint bombs, tanks and grenades, others bite their nails and sit petrified in the welcome classes. Added to this is the uncertainty as to whether and when the father will rejoin the family. “We don’t even know what’s in store for us psychologically,” said Piazolo. At the same time, he warned against too high expectations of the education system. “School can’t do everything either,” said the minister. Even before the war, many school psychologists were at their limit because of the consequences of the pandemic.

Nevertheless, the minister advocated seeing the crisis as an opportunity for the Bavarian school system, which is considered to be rather rigid. You can now try new things. Cross-school groups could also be “definitely useful”. He’s already a fan of doing more in the team, he said. One would also be in close contact with other federal states. Then he let himself be carried away to a rather atypical sentence for a Bavarian government politician. “I don’t have the impression that we automatically do everything best in Bavaria,” said Piazolo.

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