Germany's teacher shortage puts schools in crisis mode

For more than 30 years, Rebecca* has been teaching at a high school near Hamburg. Her subjects are English and history.

German, math and English are classified as "core subjects" and prioritized for instruction. When staffing falls short, other subjects such as history classes are canceled — sometimes for months at a time.

"We are always understaffed," said Rebecca. "The school administration can't fill vacancies and often my co-workers are out sick for weeks or even months because they're burned out from overwork."

The result is cuts in the curriculum. Some schools have resorted to a four-day week for classes. Across Germany, tens of thousands more teachers are needed. No one knows the exact number the school system is missing.

In Germany's federalized system, education falls under the authority of the 16 regional states. The resulting differences in the kinds of schools, in curricula and teachers' workloads make it difficult to compare the situation and gain an overview for the whole of Germany.

More schoolkids, fewer teachers

The Education Ministers' Conference, the body of the 16 state education ministers who attempt to coordinate education policies, estimates that 14,000 full-time teaching positions are currently vacant.

Economists, education researchers and the GEW teachers' union all consider that figure too low. "By 2035, the gap in the supply and demand of teachers will grow to 56,000 full-time positions," said Anja Bensinger-Stolze, who heads up GEW. She bases that conclusion on a GEW study released in September, which forecast that the total number of vacant teaching positions in Germany's schools, including part time, could reach half a million by 2035.

Germany's statistics office has calculated that the 830,000 children who started school in 2023 represent the highest number of children starting school in 20 years.

The rise is partly due to higher birth rates, but especially because of increased immigration to Germany. The situation is set to become even more acute in 2026, when a legal right to full-day supervision takes effect for elementary school children.

A university degree is required to become a teacher. Education programs are financed by the respective regional states, but an education degree qualifies the holder to teach anywhere in Germany, so there is competition between the states to attract more teachers.

For many years, politicians have taken advantage of this system to cut costs, said Bensinger-Stolze. "For years, nearly all regional states have been training fewer teachers than they were projected to need. Each one has been counting on the others," she said.

Strategies against the shortfall

As demand grows more urgent, schools have increasingly been recruiting people from other professions who have no educational training. Meanwhile, with the teaching career growing increasingly unattractive, many university students have been abandoning teaching programs.

Recommendations by the Education Ministers' Conference to fight the shortfall could actually make things worse. That's largely because their recommendations include more hours of instruction and higher retirement ages and would restrict part-time work as much as possible.

And yet, year after year, increasing numbers of teachers are choosing to work part time. Today, some 40% of all teachers in Germany are employed on a part-time basis. One of them is Rebecca, who officially teaches 23.5 periods a week instead of the standard 25.

"Actual teaching, preparation and adjustment, correcting tests and exams — despite my years of experience, it all totals more than 40 hours a week," she said.

In general, working conditions have deteriorated substantially in recent years. Class sizes have grown and instruction is taking up more of teachers' time.

"We have more pupils from other countries who need more attention because they don't get as much support at home," said Rebecca.

Maintaining discipline in class has also taken a new turn. "I don't let myself be put off when a pupil with a Muslim background tells me they won't take orders from me," said Rebecca. "But sometimes I hear the same thing from parents! And that overwhelms many young co-workers, who have just started their teaching careers and see their authority clearly being challenged."

GEW urges 'faster recognition' for foreign degrees

The GEW union has laid out a 15-point plan to keep more teachers in the profession while making it more attractive to others. The plan calls for fewer working hours for teachers, smaller classes and better health protection and support systems.

These systems would include interdisciplinary teams in which teachers collaborate with social workers, day care workers and psychologists, as well as interpreters and teachers who speak the languages of migrant children.

"We have long been demanding better and faster recognition for education degrees acquired abroad," said Bensinger-Stolze, referencing the rise in Ukrainian refugees.

Teachers in Germany must be qualified to teach more than one subject. Foreign teachers, for example those from Ukraine, often teach only one subject. For this reason, Ukrainian teachers have so far had no chance to start working in German schools.

Yet the GEW holds out little hope that the situation in Germany's schools will change any time soon.

*Name changed to protect anonymity.

This article was originally written in German.

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