4 months in office – Minister of Education: “You never please everyone”

„krone“: Mr Federal Minister, you have been in office for almost four months – criticisms of you have come unusually quickly, there are already open letters, calls for help from the school authorities and calls for your resignation. Have you underestimated the work?
Martin Polaschek: I find that in this office you are always dealing with people who are unhappy with the decisions for various reasons. That’s part of it. The field of education is one that deeply affects many people. In that regard, I think you have to live with it.

The criticism comes from many different quarters. Teacher unions are calling on you to resign, just like the mayor of Traiskirchner or the Viennese schoolboy Mati Randow, who only posted a corresponding video on social media last weekend. Doesn’t this abundance of criticism give you food for thought?
I think about the political culture in the country, when people immediately ask someone to resign if they don’t like a decision. It wouldn’t even occur to me to ask someone to do it. If you depended only on what people yell at you, the office would be unmanageable. Especially when it comes to Covid, you never please everyone.

Your predecessor Heinz Faßmann often spoke out and sometimes made decisions that were beyond his authority. You are accused of doing nothing at all. You get the impression that you want to dive through it so as not to be criticized. But can you dive through a pandemic?
We are not diving through the pandemic. Anyone who knows me knows that I am a very energetic person who likes to work hard. We are in pandemic management, we have passed the general tightening phase calmly and proportionately.

Not everyone sees it that way. After that time in March, when the corona figures literally exploded, some ministers, including you, said “that was unforeseeable”. Experts had foreseen this very well.
No, they don’t. There were intensive talks, experts say the wave will break by early March at the latest. Then individual experts said it wouldn’t go back after all. This topic is generally not easy. Whatever decision you make, it’s easy to find someone who says it’s not right.

In any case, many experts reject the statement “it was unforeseeable”. The decision to relax the mask requirement after the semester break, when many infections occurred, also caused a stir.
The mask arrangement was not changed immediately after the school holidays, but the deadline was after the last of the three holiday dates. We also said that students should test themselves before returning to school. And if you look at the numbers, the infections in the school were about the same as in the entire population.

Now people are again being warned of the fall and are urging preparations. Somehow, after two years of pandemic, it often seems that politicians are still surprised by the virus. How are the preparations going?
Of course we are preparing for the autumn, we must be prepared that there may be an increased number of infections again. We are in intensive discussions with the Minister of Health, it will be about designing an overarching strategy. At the Ministry of Education, we think about different scenarios.

Can you specify the plans?
I can tell you a lot about what we’re thinking about. But I still don’t know what’s to come. We go through different scenarios depending on how many infections there are, which variant we are dealing with and so on.

You recently announced a €500 reward for drivers – as a thank you for their hard work during the corona pandemic. But teachers did too, why don’t they get anything?
This was also preceded by a lot of discussions, we thought about what we could do to set an example. Everyone had a lot to do and the teaching staff were also very busy. But the directors were responsible for the whole coordination, and a lot came together with them.

But can’t you see you’re making the teachers mad?
The directors achieve a lot and have a great deal of responsibility. We have therefore met this requirement of professional representation.

The second big problem besides Corona in the schools is the refugee children from Ukraine, who have to be integrated and cared for in the classes. What exactly is happening in this area?
Nearly 6,000 Ukrainian children currently attend Austrian schools. We started it very early. We quickly made the right teaching materials available. Where larger groups of Ukrainian children come, we set up our own German tutoring classes and offer German courses at the same time. There is information material for parents in English and Ukrainian. We have developed our own buddy system, which is currently being finalized: Ukrainian students living here help and care for Ukrainian children.

It won’t be long before the Matura comes. Unlike in the previous two school years, the oral exam is again compulsory. This is heavily criticized by the young people, they point out that they too have had a Corona year and insist on shelter. Stick to your decision, has the last word been spoken?
Yes. It stays. This year there are again a number of simplifications. But I think the oral Matura is a good and right measure for everyone.

Finally, are you actually disappointed if you are not asked about your haircut in an interview?
I don’t even hear the question anymore.