Room for development

NEOS want to extend the time in elementary school

Vienna's City Councillor for Education Christoph Wiederkehr

(Bild: APA/GEORG HOCHMUTH)

Are our children being promoted to the next school level too quickly? Vienna's City Councillor for Education Christoph Wiederkehr (NEOS) can imagine extending elementary school from four to six years. The pressure in the fourth grade is an "unbelievable burden".

Children are currently being divided into grammar school or secondary school too early, he said in an interview with "Wien heute". "We need to change the education system much faster so that children are prepared for a self-determined, successful life," said Wiederkehr.

Longer bridge as a means to success?
Elementary school is the type of school that "works quite well and is child-oriented". Children were being pushed into grammar school or secondary school far too early.

Wiederkehr believes that two additional years at elementary school would also take the pressure off pupils and parents. "The fourth year at elementary school is an incredible burden for everyone involved."

Teaching democracy and promoting German
In the area of elementary education, Wiederkehr once again spoke out in favor of a second compulsory year of kindergarten. This would also be good for language acquisition. Figures from Statistics Austria show that around half of all Viennese schoolchildren do not speak German in everyday life. Vienna would counteract this with language support, said Wiederkehr.

The city councillor demanded an opportunity index from the Ministry of Education, which would provide schools with special challenges with more funding. There should also be democracy lessons for everyone from elementary school onwards. "The earlier we teach children what the values are here: Equal rights for men and women or that a religious book should never be above the law, the more can be done."

Numbers are on the rise
The new school year will once again bring slightly more "Taferlklassler" (first-year pupils) and a slight increase in the total number of pupils. According to estimates by Statistics Austria, 98,000 primary school pupils will experience their first day of school. This is 0.6 percent more than in the previous school year.

The Vienna Green Party warned on Tuesday that the "school start chaos" they identified in Vienna last year will be repeated this year. The party leader Judith Pühringer and the education spokesperson duo Julia Malle and Felix Stadler expressed their conviction at a press conference that the shortage of teachers is "becoming increasingly dramatic", especially at elementary school. They called for measures to make the profession more attractive - such as higher salaries.

Greens for "mixed" classes
They also complained that Vienna's schools were becoming increasingly segregated. Parents would try anything to get their child a place at their preferred school. This is understandable. However, those parents who know the system, speak the language and have contacts have a clear advantage over those who do not have this knowledge, said the Greens. As a result, hardly any children in some primary school classes speak German as their first language. However, kindergartens and schools should be socially and economically mixed.

The Greens are therefore calling for school choice to be expanded to include socio-economic criteria. In future, parents should be able to specify five preferred schools. The final allocation would be made centrally according to the criteria of proximity to home, siblings, first language and parents' level of education. This is intended to achieve a better mix locally. The expansion of language and German support in kindergarten was also called for.