Quality Control in NRW Schools to be Changed

mixed classroom

The Ministry of Education in NRW is contemplating doing away with the random quality control of schools within the State. Apparently, they want to avoid the usual habit of teachers organising and acting all prim and proper before and during the inspection only to revert to their old ways. They plan to make the inspection less stressful for the teachers.

Usually the current quality control haven’t been as frequent as they plan to make it with most of the 6500 schools in NRW having had only one inspection in the past 16yrs. There are only 90 qualified inspectors for the whole State, and each inspection takes between 3 to 4 days. The new plan will also reduce the number of documents required by the inspectors from 30 to only 4.

I think this is definitely a positive move, especially for the foreign kids in German schools. NRW having a HUGE foreign population is a good thing in that the discrimination is less than in places with fewer foreigners (no scientific backing to that statement) BUT for the children in schools it’s not a blessing. It’s a fact that public schools with higher populations of foreign kids have worse facilities and are of worse quality than schools with higher populations of German kids (based on facts).

This could be due to a host of very valid reasons from:

1. Most foreigners in Germany don’t have the financial capabilities to finance the school

2. Most foreigners aren’t involved in their children’s education

3. Outright discrimination from the officials and having lower expectations for foreign kids in Germany

You can pick any of the above as the reason but regardless of which one you pick, a regular inspection of the schools is a good thing. We’ve seen cases of children being sent to Hauptschule despite being Gymnasium material, only to be moved to the correct school during an inspection due to the “mix-up” caused by the teacher. Regular inspection of schools will definitely be something foreign parents should welcome in NRW.

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