education
Billions for school digitization hardly arrive
Students work on computers in a classroom at an elementary school. Photo: Friso Gentsch/dpa
© dpa-infocom GmbH
The federal government wants to invest more than six billion euros in the digitization of schools in Germany. So far, however, little has arrived there.
Around three years after the start of the Digital Pact for Schools for the digitization of Germany’s schools, only around 1.2 billion euros have now been spent. This was announced by the Federal Ministry of Education on Friday in Berlin.
“So far, the money for tablets and laptops for schoolchildren has mainly arrived,” said Federal Education Minister Bettina Stark-Watzinger. The FDP politician admitted that the outflow figures reported by the federal states fell short of expectations.
Further acceleration is urgently needed, said Stark-Watzinger. “Together with the countries, I therefore want to break down hurdles.” Critics have repeatedly complained about complicated application procedures. According to the ministry, 2.4 billion euros have already been approved but not yet paid out.
The Digital Pact School consists of several parts. It was launched in 2019 to expand the infrastructure in the schools. The federal government is giving 5 billion euros for this – not even a tenth of this has been paid out so far, at 432 million euros.
Bureaucratic hurdles too high?
The federal states had increased federal funds to 7.15 billion euros. The term of the digital pact ends in 2024.
In three additional agreements, the federal and state governments then agreed 500 million euros from the federal government for end devices for schoolchildren in the course of the corona pandemic, almost all of which were used. 500 million euros should be available for rental equipment for teachers – it has actually been 300 so far. A further EUR 500 million was made available to support digital technology administrators. So far, only 11 million euros have flowed from this.
The President of the Conference of Ministers of Education, Schleswig-Holstein Minister Karin Prien (CDU), praised the digital pact, but also spoke out in favor of reducing bureaucratic hurdles. She announced: “That must also be our claim for a follow-up program to the Digital Pact School.” Even after 2024, the “digitization of schools” will be a joint task of the federal, state and local authorities.