When the new school year begins next week in Saxony, one thing will be different from the vast majority of federal states: There is - as of today, Tuesday - no general mask requirement. Schools should decide for themselves whether pupils have to wear mouth and nose protection. We are used to a lot when it comes to educational federalism, but these days we are often amazed at how different the Corona rules are - and how quickly education ministers change their attitudes.
There is hardly any other topic that is wrestled as much as the mask requirement in class, sometimes even in court. ("Debate of the Week"). Many parents, teachers and students are not only annoyed because of this. Lessons have hardly started again after the holidays when a number of schools had to close due to corona cases. However, many are still not prepared to switch to digital learning, warn experts. ("That's going on")
The realization that digitization in Germany's schools urgently needs to be accelerated has now reached the Chancellery. From there there is at least, shall we say, a strong expression of will to move the matter forward. We think: It is worth taking a closer look at how other countries are managing their schools through the corona crisis. In this newsletter you will find tips for further reading.
If you have any questions or suggestions, please contact us at kleinepause@newsletter.spiegel.de.
The "Kleine Pause" team wishes you a good time.
Susmita Arp, Silke Fokken, Armin Himmelrath
That's going on
1. Hardly open, closed again
Empty classroom: an undesirable condition in Corona Germany (symbol photo)
Photo:Caroline Seidel / dpa
No matter how controversial the Corona rules in the schools are in detail, everyone from Health Minister Jens Spahn to Education Ministers, parents and teachers' associations agrees on one point: that in Germany, as in March, all schools will be closed again, must be avoided if possible. "The absence of social learning, encounters at school and an adult reference person outside the family cannot simply be compensated for and leaves deep marks in children's souls," says Udo Beckmann, Chairman of the Association for Education and Upbringing (VBE).
Thousands of students and at least a few hundred teachers are still sitting at home. Because there were corona cases, several schools had to temporarily close completely in the new school year. Or individual years or classes were sent into quarantine. The authorities do not record precisely how many schools nationwide are affected. A private initiative is therefore evaluating local media reports and has created a map of Germany, which you can find here.
How many pupils and teachers are not allowed to go to school for how long is not decided by the school ministries, but by the health authorities. Harald Willert, chairman of the North Rhine-Westphalia school management association, criticizes SPIEGEL for the fact that their approach is often very different, even in similar cases. That creates a lot of uncertainty. In addition, "in fact nothing" has happened to digitization in many schools.
2. Digitization
The good news: Chancellor Angela Merkel, SPD leader Saskia Esken, Federal Minister of Education Anja Karliczek and several ministers of education all agree that digitization must urgently be promoted in Germany's schools. "We are all wildly determined," was the tenor of a school summit in the Chancellery. The group found that what has long been the practice in companies should also become reality in schools: equipping employees, i.e. teachers, with work laptops. There will be a second school summit soon. However, the round cannot decide anything. Education remains a matter of the country.
In addition, purchasing hardware is not enough. The "Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung" takes up unanswered questions about data protection in digital learning under the heading "Woe to when schools close again". Jürgen Möller, head of the Cologne Academy for Learning Education, also believes that there is still a lot of need for education: "Many teachers understand digitization to mean that they send scanned PDFs by email." Möller explains, among other things, in "Zeit" what he means by a "flipped classroom".
In some rural areas, however, the basic requirements for offering digital lessons at all are lacking, as Andrea Kunkel, state chairman of the Lower Saxony school management association, complains: "If I don't have WiFi at the school, I also have difficulties working with tablets here . "
Countries like Denmark and Norway invested in the digitization of their schools years ago and are therefore "resilient" in the pandemic, says education researcher Olaf Köller. In this SPIEGEL story, you can read what Germany can learn from the Nordic countries and their school policies during the corona crisis. Spoiler: more serenity. The "Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland" has created an overview of schools in Corona times, for example in the USA, Kenya or Japan.
3. What else was there
In Great Britain, students, parents and teachers were upset because the grades for the final exams canceled due to Corona should not be set by the teachers - but with the help of controversial software. The goal: the teachers' assessments, which tend to be too positive, should be reduced to the average level of previous years.
In fact, 39 percent of all final grades were devalued by the algorithm. Read here why critics found the approach socially unjust - and who ultimately prevailed in the dispute.
Debate of the week
Students with mouth and nose protection: some have to wear it, others don't, at least not in class (symbol photo)
Photo:Arne Dedert / dpa
Six federal states will be returning from vacation in the coming days and starting with different rules on the mask requirement. Saxony, for example, does without it, the schools should decide for themselves. In Lower Saxony, the mask must be worn in hallways or on stairs, wherever a minimum distance is not possible. So far. The decisions sometimes change faster than such a mask is soaked in sweat, citing a wide variety of arguments, for example from virologists or educational experts or after court orders.
In Schleswig-Holstein there was initially only the "urgent recommendation" to wear a mask in school. A school in Kiel, however, ordered a mask requirement in class. On the other hand, a student successfully sued in court. On the same day, Minister of Education Karien Prien (CDU) decided: The mask requirement will be introduced, but not in the classroom. In North Rhine-Westphalia, on the other hand, three students failed with a lawsuit against the mask in class.
The topic polarizes like no other. On the "German School Portal", hackers are said to have even tried to manipulate a survey on the use of masks in class in their favor. The "Süddeutsche Zeitung" advised "Be careful with the wonder weapon".
The dispute embeds itself in a general debate on the mask requirement. "Der Zünd-Stoff" was the title of a SPIEGEL cover story. A new approach has now come from CDU boss Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer. She told the "Welt am Sonntag" that if the compulsory wearing of masks in class leads to avoid the closure of schools, one should think about it.
How it will continue is open. We'll keep you up to date.
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