Aktionsrat Bildung report: Commitment at the centre

Professor Nele McElvany, member of the Aktionsrat Bildung for the primary school sector and head of the IGLU study in Germany, strongly supports the report's calls for more commitment and sees an urgent need for reform in the primary school sector on the part of the state, education system, educational institutions and educational stakeholders. “The deficits that begin in primary school continue throughout all levels of education, which is why we urgently need a more binding focus on promoting core skills in primary school education,” emphasises McElvany. The central prerequisite for strengthening core skills and promoting educational equity, especially against the backdrop of increasing linguistic heterogeneity, is a binding diagnostic and strengthened support system, which is the responsibility of the state.

“With regard to the education system, we are proposing greater flexibility in the primary school period in order to do justice to the great heterogeneity in the developmental stages of children starting school,” explains McElvany. The further development and binding design of teacher training is also important: “The promotion of core skills such as reading and maths and the appropriate inclusion of digital media are often not sufficiently addressed in teacher training courses. That needs to change.” More commitment is also needed in all-day schooling: “The expansion of all-day schooling in Germany offers great opportunities in terms of strengthening core skills, but only if it is also used in an educationally effective way, which has rarely been the case systematically to date. The educational quality of the programmes urgently needs to be expanded with binding guidelines on concepts, times and personnel.”

Further information: Press release