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Germany - 2011

Are there positive initiatives to improve/support poor educational provision for migrant and minority groups?

Code:
RED79
Key Area:
Education
Strand(s):
Discrimination, Equality
23/02/2012 - 15:31
Short Answer
Qualitative Info

In October 2008, acting within the framework of their Qualification Initiative for Germany, the Federal Government announced that the promotion measures for adolescents should be enhanced. The goal is to offer young persons, especially those with a migration background, the possibility to graduate from lower secondary school (German Federal Government 2008, 10).
The Federal Government plans to increase its budget for education and science by 12 billion euros until 2013. The Federal Ministry for Education and Science (Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung, BMBF) will develop new measures addressing the special needs of young people with a migration background and will continue to implement positive measures (BMBF 2012).

A working group on “Integration through education” (Integration durch Bildung) has been established in 2011 aiming to improve the education for young migrants and to enhance parental involvement. The group consists of representatives of the Federal Government and the Länder (Bund-Länder-Arbeitsgruppen) (German Federal Government 2011).


In the Federal States North-Rhine Westphalia and Hesse, practical barriers for undocumented migrants to enrol their children at school have been removed since March 2008 and December 2009. Families are not in the duty to provide official registration documents when they intend to enrol their children at school. Further, schools are not obliged to inform the foreigners´ department about the undocumented status of the children. In Berlin, the State Senate for Education, Sciences and Research issued an official information statement to all public schools in Berlin in November 2009 to underline the right of children with undocumented status to attend school (Peucker 2010, 20). Since July 2011, these provisions have been applied at the national level. The German Bundestag passed a bill which suspends the obligation of public authorities in the field of education to inform the foreigners´ authorities in case they become aware of an irregular status of migrants (German Federal Press Office 2011).


The promotion of German language skills is a key issue in education policies. In all Federal States a language proficiency assessment is common followed by promotion of the children prior to their enrolment. Nevertheless, no data is available that could give a summary of children with migration background who have special educational needs. Municipalities aim to promote language skills, especially in the early childhood education. Therefore, the programme “Mothers learn German” (Mütter lernen Deutsch) was implemented to improve the language skills of the parents and thus increase the incentive for children to speak German. Such measures are very important, especially in regard to the fact, that 15.7 per cent of the children in kindergartens do not speak German in the first place in their parents´ home. (BAMF 2010, 83-85)

Source:
Groups affected/interested Migrants, Ethnic minorities, Religious minorities, Asylum seekers, National minorities
Type (R/D)
Key socio-economic / Institutional Areas Education, Integration - social cohesion
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