Education Minister Martin Polaschek takes stock at the end of the school day: With the “Krone” he talks about the serious reading problems of the students and why young people without basic skills can become a social problem.
Crown: Today, nine school-free weeks begin for half a million schoolchildren. Experts say that children with a deficiency tend to fall behind during the long summer holidays. Shouldn’t the summer school for students with learning difficulties introduced during the Corona period become compulsory?
Poland check: I don’t believe in an obligation, because that always means stigmatization. The voluntary summer school makes more sense. There is a need for improvement in communicating to parents with educational disadvantages the opportunities that education means for their children.
Shouldn’t the state put more pressure on parents?
I believe we must rely on persuasion. And that’s why we introduced the German remedial classes. Of course, it is not okay for teachers to deliberately ignore and undermine this. Because they have a responsibility – especially to the children.
A quarter of 15-year-olds cannot read after school. Shouldn’t there be more achievements at school?
The idea of performance has diminished, we can see that very well. I don’t believe in throwing numbers away. Children need clarity. If I want to tell a child whether it has done something right or not, that is exactly what I say. In the coming school year, we will pay a lot of attention to reading promotion.
Should performance be prioritized again?
We must also emphasize that it is important to perform. Unfortunately, we have children who leave school without basic skills. More and more companies complain that graduates cannot read, write or count. I am strongly in favor of reclaiming this basic knowledge in the interest of society and in the interest of these young people themselves, so that they can lead a self-determined life.
More and more children also have psychological problems, why do politicians look the other way?
Two years ago, we increased the number of school psychologists by 20 percent and doubled the number of school social workers. A lot has also been done in the field of support hours. We take the subject seriously and are looking into whether more support is needed in schools or beyond. But this is an area where the Minister of Health is very challenged.
Since the outbreak of the pandemic more than three years ago, children and young people have been exposed to an increasing number of crises. How do politicians react to this?
We need to support the teachers more at school and that is why we want to supplement the recreational pedagogical model with the pedagogical assistant and thus also have support staff in the schools in the mornings. We are well behind the European average in terms of the number of teaching support staff and there is a very clear call from the OECD to increase this number.
Education experts criticize the education system as outdated, don’t they?
The school is changing, but things are going much better than people say.
Source: Krone
I am Ida Scott, a journalist and content author with a passion for uncovering the truth. I have been writing professionally for Today Times Live since 2020 and specialize in political news. My career began when I was just 17; I had already developed a knack for research and an eye for detail which made me stand out from my peers.
