Start the new school year full of energy ©Monkey Business-stock.adobe.com
Bavaria’s schools are starting the 2024/2025 school year. On Tuesday, September 10, classes will begin again for around 1.72 million students and their teachers – including 134,000 first-graders. This means that the total number of students has increased by around 31,000 compared to the previous year.
At her press conference to mark the start of the school year, to which she invited people to the Marieluise-Fleißer secondary school in Munich, Minister of Education Anna Stolz looked ahead to a school year that will bring with it many innovations. She stressed: “I want our schools to be lively, positive and inspiring places for our students and attractive workplaces for our teachers. The starting point and goal of all my considerations is always the question of how we can make our children and young people strong for their future lives. That is why I will continue the path of dialogue so that together we can continuously improve our good education system and together shape the school of the future.”
Innovations for the start of school
One of the innovations at the start of school is the implementation of the PISA offensive, which will strengthen basic skills in primary schools in the long term. School integration is also a continuously growing task. With the introduction of compulsory language assessments, language support measures and the further development of German classes for initial school integration, a solid foundation was created for this at the start of school. The Minister of Education is also giving new impetus to political education by introducing the constitutional quarter hour and by expanding everyday skills.
The “digital school of the future” is also taking shape thanks to the start of a comprehensive 1:1 equipment with mobile devices. With an AI and media budget, schools are given the opportunity to continue to shape the digital transformation with tailor-made applications.
Outlook on further innovations
Anna Stolz also took the opportunity to present projects that are important to her personally and that go back to the “Future Workshop on Education in Bavaria” – a dialogue format that the minister launched last year in all administrative districts together with the school community. The results and suggestions are currently still being evaluated, but the minister has already announced three measures in particular for the new school year: “This year, I will significantly increase the focus on the health of students, but also of teachers. Resilience, mindfulness, stress management and time management are becoming increasingly important. In addition, we will modernize the curricula in all types of schools, in particular streamlining them. We will also fundamentally address the further development of the examination culture this school year! In dialogue with the school families, I want to take a close look at what, how and how much we should examine in the future.”
3,800 new teachers
The best education for Bavaria’s students can only be achieved with enough well-trained teachers. For the 2024/2025 school year, the Free State will be hiring around 3,800 new teachers, including 1,600 in newly created positions. In addition, there will be 600 additional positions for multi-professional staff (e.g. educational support staff, school administration staff, etc.). Around 3,700 teaching graduates are also starting seminar training, and around 600 career changers are also registered for the two-year preparatory service. Anna Stolz said: “Overall, staffing is challenging, but manageable. I would like to thank everyone who has worked hard to advance staff planning in recent weeks. You have played a very important role in ensuring that we can start the new school year well despite the challenges.”
At the end of the press conference, the Minister of Education wished all students, especially first-graders, all teachers, all school staff and, last but not least, all parents and guardians a healthy, good and successful new school year.
