The family vacation is imminent, but Julie Knepper’s anticipation has been dampened. Only a few days ago she found out that the grammar school in Messestadt, which her ten-year-old child was supposed to attend from September, could not yet open. Many other parents are angry like Knepper. And local politicians are also wondering what is actually going on at the education campus of the Riemer trade fair city.
Almost exactly three weeks before school started and thus the planned opening of the high school on the new educational campus, the Department for Education and Sport (RBS) had informed in a letter that the opening was delayed. “After the start of the summer holidays,” the “construction was not so far advanced that safe and trouble-free school operations at the start of the new school year” were possible. The city authority cites the “effects of the corona pandemic” as reasons, plus “material and delivery bottlenecks” caused by the war in Ukraine. 386 students are affected. They are to be taught temporarily in rooms in Ludwigsvorstadt.
An open letter addressed to Mayor Dieter Reiter (SPD), City School Inspector Florian Kraus, but also representatives of the Bavarian state government shows that the Knepper family is not the only one who is bothered by this. Around 150 people have signed. The paper states: “Parenthood is seething with rage.”
Those affected are most annoyed by “the lack of communication”
Knepper says what annoys her the most is “the lack of communication.” The department for education and sport informed the parents far too late. And the time during the holidays was also poorly chosen, since some families – like you soon – are on vacation. On request, the RBS states that you first had to find an interim quarter. When they found “a secure solution to the problem,” they informed them.
The mother also criticizes that the way to school now takes 45 minutes instead of “five minutes”. There is also a lack of time to “try out” the new path with the children. It is not yet clear how long the students from the east of Munich have to commute to the city center. The city says that they want to “limit the interim operation to as short a period of time as possible”. Together with the Munich spatial development company (MRG), they are working on a “resilient schedule”.
The frustration is not only great among the families. The local politicians in the east of Munich are also dissatisfied. “For those affected, it’s – to put it mildly – shit,” stated Christoph Heidenhain, who holds a mandate for the Greens in the Trudering-Riem district committee, at the most recent meeting. While some colleagues complained about the distance from the interim location to the district, Magdalena Miehle (CSU) made it clear: “Children from the age of 11 can definitely handle it.” You don’t have to “beg” them like small children.
The committee agreed that, as Heidenhain put it, it was an “unsatisfactory, annoying situation”. You now have to “quite clearly ask”. The district committee therefore demands that representatives of the RBS and the MRG in a special session “present the background” https://www.sueddeutsche.de/muenchen/. “They should explain that to us,” agrees district committee boss Stefan Ziegler (CSU). Such a public appointment would also offer the opportunity to involve the parents in the communication.