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Education and teacher unions have criticized the Standing Scientific Commission's (SWK) recommendation to tackle teacher shortages.
"With these measures, the failure of politics is carried out on the back of the teachers," said Gerhard Brand, chairman of the Education and Training Association (VBE).
The 16 SWK scientists had been commissioned by the Ministers of Education to draw up proposals that should help in the short and medium term to compensate for the thousands of missing teaching positions.
This includes, for example, limiting part-time work, redistributing staff and cutting teaching time at high schools.
Many of the suggestions are impractical and counterproductive, said the President of the German Teachers' Association, Heinz-Peter Meidinger.
»Anyone who wants to limit or abolish part-time work and age reductions is driving even more teachers into early retirement and burnout.«
Spiral of overload from teacher shortages and teacher shortages from overload
The chairwoman of the Education and Science Union (GEW), Maike Finnern, also said that the SWK's recommendations would "only put an additional burden on the already overburdened teachers".
There is a risk of a spiral of overload due to teacher shortages and teacher shortages due to overload, which will lead to people leaving the profession.
To recommend "mindfulness training and yoga" as a balance is "blatant mockery".
The German Association of Philologists described the recommendations as one-sided and also criticized the fact that the pressure on teachers was increasing and that the health promotion measures were "almost a mockery".
However, the SWK association agreed on other points.
“It cannot be that teachers continue to invest their time in organizing class trips and billing them instead of preparing for lessons in a qualified manner,” said the association.
In its recommendations, the SWK calls for the teachers to be relieved of administrative and organizational tasks so that they can concentrate on the lessons.
There are “no taboos” in the discussion
The chairwoman of the Conference of Ministers of Education (KMK), the Berlin Education Senator Astrid-Sabine Busse (SPD), thanked the SWK.
You will be based on the "substantiated scientific assessments and then act carefully," she announced.
It is a "big balancing act".
You have to do justice to the children's right to education, but you also have a »duty of care for the teachers«.
The representatives of Hamburg and Hesse, Ties Rabe (SPD) and Alexander Lorz (CDU), both welcomed the fact that there were "no taboos" in the discussion.
Lorz said that this also applies to the question of whether the right to part-time work could be limited in the future, at least for new contracts.
Through the proposed measures, he
"
received some confirmation, some homework and some good ideas for the future."
sun/dpa